Concentrix

Patricia Gibson Excerpts

Wednesday 26th October 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mhairi Black (Paisley and Renfrewshire South) (SNP)]

The Scottish National party will fully support Labour’s motion. I thank the hon. Member for Salford and Eccles (Rebecca Long Bailey) for making the case so eloquently, but I think it is worth while reiterating some key points.

HMRC gave the contract to Concentrix, with the

“additional capacity to review and correct tax credit claims that are potentially based on incorrect information.”

One of the main tasks of Concentrix was to find people with an “undisclosed partner” and to see whether they were claiming the benefit as a single person but actually living with others. That is where the problem really begins. Concentrix spent a considerable amount of money putting out “fishing” letters to try to catch people claiming fraudulently. In a written answer on 7 September, the Treasury Minister said that Concentrix sent out 381,000 letters to tax credit claimants requesting proof of single status; 254,000 letters asking for details of hours worked; and 312,000 letters asking for evidence of childcare use.

Concentrix’s logic was that, unless people replied with the appropriate evidence, their tax credits would be stopped. However, despite all those letters apparently being sent out, thousands of people had absolutely no idea they were being investigated. Quite often, they did not know that they were under investigation, or that their tax credits had been stopped.

[Patricia Gibson (North Ayrshire and Arran) (SNP)]

Given the clampdown on supposedly fraudulent claims with these fishing letters, would it not be good to see the same rigour applied to aggressive corporate tax avoidance?

--- Later in debate ---

[Kevin Foster]

The focus should be on what went wrong, waiting to see what the National Audit Office comes up with—I shall say more about that shortly—observing the reaction to that and dealing with the issues, rather than getting into a debate about whether the gesture of an apology should be made. That said, I am pleased that the Government are not seeking to nit-pick the Opposition motion, that we are not going to divide the House, and that, effectively, we will support the motion. That, I think, speaks for itself.

In the light of the problems that had been raised with me, I welcomed the Government’s action in making it very clear that the contract would not be renewed. It is over a month since the last new case was sent to Concentrix. I am also pleased that HMRC is moving in to resolve many of the issues.

[Patricia Gibson]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Kevin Foster]

Will the hon. Lady give it a moment? I shall make some more progress, for now.

I said that HMRC was moving in. It should be noted that that organisation has had its own customer service issues in the past. In fact, in the next half hour my fellow members of the Public Accounts Committee will be discussing and examining its customer service. There have been some welcome improvements recently, but many Members who are present today will have had their own experiences of sitting and waiting to get through to the “hotline”.