Loan Charge

Robert Neill Excerpts

Thursday 11th April 2019 Commons Chamber

[Robert Neill (Bromley and Chislehurst) (Con)]

I have met constituents and seen copious documentation that they have brought me that reinforces everything that has been said by every other hon. Member in the Chamber, in particular about the good faith in which people entered into these schemes, the lassitude with which Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs originally pursued the matter, and the arbitrary way in which it acted thereafter. I endorse the calls for a pause to the scheme, for an independent inquiry and for the retrospective element to be removed. It simply is not just.

There is an old legal saying—perhaps you recall it, Madam Deputy Speaker—that he who comes to equity must have clean hands. The person who seeks the redress of the courts must have acted in good faith. I fear the Revenue has not acted in good faith in this matter, with my constituents or with taxpayers generally. There is an aggressive attitude towards tax collection that has gone beyond the bounds of fairness.

The other legal observation I make is that of Mrs Justice Whipple, who said in a Revenue case in 2015 that HMRC’s primary duty—to collect tax—is not

“a trump card which prevails over all other considerations.”

Instead, she said, it is

“a broad duty, exercised by means of a wide managerial discretion, within which is embedded the obligation to treat taxpayers fairly”.

My constituents, as taxpayers, saw years go by in which the Revenue had the opportunity to raise its concerns about these schemes with them but did nothing. Their bills therefore ran up, and then, suddenly, they were hit with arbitrary figures. They have not been treated fairly by the Revenue in this case, and we look to the Minister to put that right.