Administrative burden on HMRC is increasing

In its annual report on the state of tax administration TaxWatch notes that the UK leaving the EU necessitated an entire new system of customs arrangements for the UK costing at least £1bn in investment. It considers that with the UK government phasing in border controls on imported goods over 2021 and 2022 the burden is only increasing as time goes on.

As another example of the administrative burden placed on HMRC TaxWatch refers to the coronavirus support schemes. The report says these schemes which HMRC set up and administered quickly to protect jobs while the country ground to a halt were subject to wide-scale abuse costing billions of pounds.

The report considers that the timing of Brexit coupled with the pandemic resulted in the UK’s tax administration facing a difficult task without equal in modern times and caused a huge amount of...