Finance Bill

I was talking about what had been experienced in the past, but we can all sign up to the pious statement that we will achieve as much simplicity as possible. I merely say on the basis of practical experience in the House that, unfortunately, when we have sought simplicity, people have argued for further complexity to tackle the loopholes. However, we will all aim for simplicity, and the onus is on us to try to draft legislation in a way that achieves it. I welcomed the Minister's statement about the continuation of, and consultation on, the commitment to the anti-avoidance rule, but I hoped that at some stage a future report from Government would enable us to engage in a wider debate on how we could install in legislation the duty to comply more simply and effectively. As my right hon. Friend the Member for East Ham (Stephen Timms) pointed out, the issue that arises time and again is the ingenious use of devices to avoid the spirit of the law. In other contexts, we draft legislation in such a way that when a device appears it can be seen to be a device, which is patently against the spirit of the legislation and whose effect can therefore be outlawed. I also welcomed the wider debate on the anti-avoidance principle to be installed in legislation. This has been a helpful debate. I leave the Minister to the savagery of Richard Murphy's blog: I am sure that Mr Murphy will respond to each of the points that he raised. Let me make this point, however: whether the tax gap is £40 billion or £120 billion, when people out there are experiencing cuts in public services and reductions in their pensions and are having to work for longer, they will expect us to collect those taxes. The subtle distinctions between evasion and avoidance will be lost on them. They will expect the House of Commons to produce legislation ensuring that HMRC is sufficiently staffed and sufficiently resourced to bring in the tax, and to deal with the significant part of the deficit that we have identified in the past few weeks. On the basis of the assurances that we have had from both Front Benches of co-operative working on this issue, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment. Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.