HMRC Office Closures

Debate between Rob Marris and Mark Tami

Tuesday 24th November 2015 Commons Chamber

[Rob Marris (Wolverhampton South West) (Lab)]

I salute the Minister’s efforts to make a good fist of things, and the efforts of this Government, and the previous coalition Government, to clamp down on tax avoidance. More should be done, but they took good steps. We need a well-functioning HMRC because we need taxes to pay for the goodies that we and our constituents want. We need a well-functioning HMRC to assist business and to maintain the confidence of taxpayers. We need a well-functioning HMRC for effective anti-money laundering steps, to clamp down on tax evasion, and to protect revenue.

It is desirable for HMRC to act efficiently, and technology is changing what it and other large organisations do. For example, 80% of self-assessment returns are now done online, and that availability of information from HMRC—including specialist knowledge—is greatly aided by the internet. There is a difficult balancing act for HMRC between providing information and guidance to businesses and individual taxpayers, and not providing tax advice, and sometimes that is difficult for staff. Like other Members, I pay tribute to the overwhelmingly hard-working and skilful staff at HMRC around the United Kingdom. It is no criticism of them that we still have a considerable tax gap. Having more staff is likely to help close that gap.

The National Audit Office estimates an 18:1 return on employing extra staff—that means that £1 more in salary means £18 more in revenue. There is, of course, a law of diminishing returns in that scenario. HMRC itself, through its chief executive, estimates a return of 11:1.

[Mark Tami (Alyn and Deeside) (Lab)]

My hon. Friend mentions valued staff. Does he agree that, as the Minister said, thousands of valued and very experienced staff will not be able to relocate and will therefore be lost to the Revenue?

[Rob Marris]

I agree, and I will come on to that in a moment. We have to look at the debate, and at what is happening with HMRC, in the context of the economy overall and the Government’s finances. In the past five years, national debt has gone up 55%. Instead of it taking five years to sort out the deficit, the Government’s own estimates say it will take 10 years. GDP per capita has stalled. The balance of payments deficit is at the highest it has been in peacetime, at 5% of GDP. Productivity has stalled. Home ownership is markedly down. It is now said that we have the fourth lowest rate of home ownership of any European Union member state. Correspondingly, net household debt is rising alarmingly. That is the economic context; we need to protect revenue.

There are problems, of course: the tax gap, to which I referred; an insufficient number of collectors; and an insufficient number of staff dealing with evasion and artificial avoidance measures. There is the difficulty—created, I have to say, by the previous Labour Government —of the disastrous contract with Mapeley, which is based, I think, in the Bahamas. The ownership of the leases of HMRC offices was transferred to Mapeley in 2001. As far as I am aware, the proposals we heard on 12 November do not address that issue in any way, except to say that we are dumping all the offices. Nothing has been said about what will happen to the leases and so on. Perhaps the Minister, in closing, could tell us a bit more about the intersection between the plans and the wretched leases with the wretched Mapeley.

Staff numbers are markedly down in recent years. According to the Office for National Statistics, between 2007 and 2010, under the previous Labour Government, the number of HMRC staff went down 9%. Under the five years of the coalition Government it went down a further 24.4%—a cumulative drop of 31.4%.