Finance (No. 3) Bill

Nigel Evans Excerpts

Tuesday 3rd May 2011 Commons Chamber

[Chris Leslie (Nottingham East) (Lab/Co-op)]

I beg to move amendment 9, page 41, line 27, at end add—

‘(2) The Chancellor shall review the bank levy and publish a report, before 31 December 2011, on—

(a) the Government’s analysis behind the rate and threshold chosen for the bank levy;

(b) the adequacy of the bank levy in the context of other reforms to the wider banking system; and

(c) the total tax revenues expected from banks across all categories of taxation in each year from 2011-12 to 2016-17.’.

[The First Deputy Chairman of Ways and Means (Mr Nigel Evans)]

With this it will be convenient to discuss clause stand part.

[Chris Leslie]

We find ourselves in the Committee stage of the Finance Bill, a rather large two-volume measure that, over the coming two days on the Floor of the House, we will no doubt explore in some detail. The Bill will then progress upstairs to Committee, where more detailed scrutiny will take place.

It is a peculiarity of Ways and Means resolutions and of the way in which proposed finance legislation is scrutinised in the House of Commons that hon. Members who are not Ministers may not table amendments to Finance Bills that would have the effect of raising the level of taxation. That was news to me, perhaps because I was in government and did not think about tabling such amendments, but the rules of order are as they are, so the amendment does not propose—because we cannot—an increase in the rate of the bank levy. Instead, it calls for a review of the rate and the general approach to bank taxation adopted by the Treasury. It seeks to look into the rationale behind the rate that the Treasury has chosen for the bank levy and why a number of other choices were made.