(7 years, 4 months ago)
Commons ChamberI agree with the hon. Lady about that. The products we should probably be targeting are those people think might be healthy but are not. I may buy a smoothie thinking that it contains lots of fruit so it must be good for me, but it, too, is high in calories. It is not a bad thing to consume that fruit; I need to have it as part of a balanced diet. Certain milk drinks are incredibly bad for people and may be worse than many soft drinks, but I am not entirely clear that the levy applies to those. If we had structured a tax that went on something high in sugar or high in calories, that may have been a way of getting to the outcome we were after.
Does my hon. Friend accept that the provisions will give rise to a public debate, and therefore to public awareness of sugar in drinks? Some people may not have been aware of that before, but they will know about it now.
Having a broader debate to raise people’s understanding that a diet cola is much healthier that a full-sugar cola for most people is helpful. I am not sure how much of an impact debates in this place or taxes on producers will have on people’s consumer decisions when they are in the supermarket, as those are probably based on price, promotion and their personal preferences or historical buying habits. However, the Government are right to tackle this issue.
Clause 108 seeks to tighten up the rules on VAT collection from fulfilment businesses. Globalisation has changed how businesses are structured so that people buy from them online. People then avoid paying VAT due in the UK, which is a big weakness. We have a generous turnover threshold. Most countries in Europe do not let people have their first £80,000 of turnover VAT-free—I believe the figure is now £83,000. It is right that we have that exemption, but we need to find ways of stopping people selling things on internet marketplaces and exploiting it, because there is a big revenue leak. This also makes it very hard for UK businesses resident here that are trying to comply with the rules to compete with those internet-based sales where people are not charging VAT on products on which they ought to be charging it. All the measures we can take to ensure that anyone trading here who turns over more than £80,000 has to charge VAT on the things they sell have to be right, and I look forward to seeing how those measures work and what more the Government can do on them.
Clause 120 deals with making tax digital, on which the Minister and I had an exchange earlier. I accept that we have to make tax more digital than it is and we have to get everybody filing returns online. I can see why the Government would want the information much earlier than they are getting it and would seek to remove the errors. Individuals and businesses do not want to make errors and they want to get their tax right. I am not sure how much we help them when we add 762 pages of Finance Bill every year and they have to try to work out how to comply with them. Making tax digital is the right thing to try to do, but I worry that if we rush the smallest businesses into it we will end up with the wrong outcome. I accept that businesses turning over more than £80,000 are probably already filing their VAT quarterly, doing monthly PAYE activities, presumably on a computer, and reporting those, and doing the same thing for auto-enrolment. Those businesses are probably already gathering, just about in the right format, all the information they need, and making these returns should not be unduly onerous for them. In that area, the advantages outweigh the downsides. However, I do worry about ending up with a perverse outcome.