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"Ethics" is a word used frequently in commercial and other activities. I would be interested in some of the ethical assessments in this case:
1. HMRC overruled an internal opinion that the structure was eligible for allowances and required the individual to re-write his opinion to state the contrary; and
2. The HMRC opinion giver left HMRC and within a year was revealing all the details of his previous work to the taxpayer. (Who made contact first? Who found who?)
Thank you for managing to get a giggle out of me on a monday morning ...
Ethics and HMRC - hohoho - how I laughed.
1. para 37 of the judgement says that while working in HMRC the expert "expressed the view that there was merit to the Appellant's claim". 'Merit' doesn't necessarily mean that the expert thought that the claim qualified, merely that the claim was worth considering.
2. the judgement doesn't say anything about what the expert told the taxpayer, merely the evidence that the expert provided to the court and that "in 2016, while working as a tax consultant, he was asked to assist with the present case"
So it isn't clear that the expert either gave a definite' the claim qualifies' opinion to HMRC and then wrote a report to the contrary to 'hold the line', or that the expert told the taxpayer confidential information gained during their time working for HMRC, or that the expert looked up the taxpayer after leaving HMRC. I agree that those aspects of the case raise ethical concerns but I wouldn't quite agree with how you phrased the points.
I note that while HMRC has incorporated PCRT into its standards for tax agents and PCRT is mandated by various membership bodies, as far as I am aware HMRC does not mandate PCRT for its own staff so the ethical standards for HMRC staff would follow a civil service code of some description unless they were also a member of a membership body which has mandated adherence to PCRT. So the ethical standards within HMRC aren't necessarily those we would expect for those outside HMRC - though I doubt the public would expect HMRC's standards to be significantly lower.
That said I think that if advising someone on the ethical position my advice would be 'don't start from here' and 'don't just behave ethically, seek to be seen as behaving ethically'.
Hi there.
That was me, and I'm happy to clarify.
My witness statement only covered the apparent conflict of interest point. I was made redundant when HMRC restructured in 2015 and one firm I provide enquiry support to passed this to me for review in 2016, around 2 years after I had been last involved in it. When in HMRC I had been a consultant on the CA point only, never the case owner. I never personally approached the client or agent and I wanted to make it clear to the FTT that I hadn't just hopped over the back fence with the HMRC silver (which has been known to happen on occasion).
When in HMRC I never personally concluded that this did qualify for allowances, merely that it was more nuanced than I first expected and that I felt it warranted further consideration. The final HMRC 'view of the matter' was issued by another officer some time after I left HMRC and the final decision as to the facts was made by the FTT.
It is amazing that we now have the authoritative answer from the horse's mouth.
Two fine responses from AndrewTall and mdoodney. Thanks and best wishes to both.
That is helpful clarification from Mr Doodney (thank you), but difficult to reconcile aspects with how it was reported by the FTT (at para 37):
"Mr Doodney worked for HMRC as a capital allowances technical specialist until 2015. While working with HMRC he was asked to provide technical advice on the basis of the Appellant’s capital allowances claim. Internally within HMRC he expressed the view that there was merit to the Appellant’s claim, but he produced a report stating that the expenditure did not qualify because he was told that it was HMRC policy to “hold the line” that such structures did not qualify. In 2016, while working as a tax consultant, he was asked to assist with the present case."
Mmmmmmmmmm why does everything end up so complicated, even though Silos have been around for 100's of years.
The only thing you could advise is, claim the lot, you may be in the right.
The fact that HMRC disregarded the Inspectors' findings lead me to believe that this wasn't a case of correctness, more of tax collection enhancement.