Findings of an all-party parliamentary group on tax fraud

Key points

• The all-party parliamentary group on anti-corruption and responsible tax has published an undated report Putting a stop to the fraud game.
• The concept that seems to underlie this report is that it does not matter what the legislation says; we can rely on a British jury to understand whether someone has broken the law. This is wrong.
• Prosecution does not encourage tax fraudsters to come forward.
• The cost of obtaining evidence of a prosecution is high and HMRC is not a prosecuting body – once a case is made the director of public prosecution must take it forward.
• Ascertaining whether a transaction is a ‘trade’ is one of the most difficult parts of tax law – should it be a basis for determining criminality?

I have been reading a report Putting a stop to the tax fraud game (tinyurl.com/TaxFraudGame). Its central thesis is that tax avoidance is...