Paul Sweeney
Main Page: Paul Sweeney (Labour (Co-op) - Glasgow North East)Department Debates - View all Paul Sweeney's debates with the HM Treasury
(6 years, 5 months ago)
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Mel Stride
The hon. Gentleman referred to a £6 billion tax gap, but the figure is not £6 billion; it is 6% of all tax that should be collected. On his suggestion that there should be a general principle or general rule, there is already a general anti-avoidance rule for exactly the purpose to which the hon. Gentleman has alluded.
Mr Paul Sweeney (Glasgow North East) (Lab/Co-op)
Over 100,000 properties in the UK, worth over £122 billion, are owned by overseas-registered UK companies in the British Virgin Islands and the Channel Islands, and that represents a conservatively estimated £2 billion in tax avoidance a year, enough to close the benefits fraud gap in one fell swoop. That is just a conservative estimate, however, and a third of the properties in the Land Registry do not even have property transaction data. Does the Minister agree that now is an opportune moment to grip the Land Registry and ensure it has compulsory registration of land and property in the UK, with the full structure of ownership and their value, so we can understand the full scale of the exploitation of UK land and property for tax avoidance purposes?
Mel Stride
This Government have brought far more property into the scope of taxation than the hon. Gentleman’s party ever did in 13 years in office, so I will not take any lectures on that point from him. [Interruption.]