Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, pursuant to the Answer of 19 May 2021 to Question 77, what assessment he has made of whether the comments made by the Fraud Investigation Service director at HMRC in response to enforcement action in the North East in September 2015 were in breach of HMRC’s statutory duty of taxpayer confidentiality; and who was responsible for authorising the publication of those comments.

The comments made by the Fraud Investigation Service director in HMRC in response to enforcement action in the North East in September 2015 were not in breach of HMRC’s statutory duty of confidentiality. It is right and proper that HMRC raise public awareness of suspected fraud on this scale and of the action they are taking in response to tackle it. None of the comments made related to the details of an individual taxpayer.