Read more about TaxWatch’s work, including reports, analysis and comment pieces.
The Government’s next steps to regulate and improve standards in the UK tax advice market betray the aims and findings of the recent consultation and demonstrate a lack of political will on the issue.
Autumn Budget increases interest charge on late paid tax debt, exacerbating problems with those struggling to pay. Interest seems to be used to raise revenue and drive compliance, a concerning development.
Rachel Reeves’ first Autumn Budget makes for a mixed bag of delivering a fairer tax system whilst raising government revenue
HMRC’s first estimate of the offshore tax gap for 2018, seems a wild underestimate at just £300 million based on questionable methodological choices.
TaxWatch launches our State of Tax Administration report, analysing HMRC’s performance in 2023-24
Latest HMRC figures show the cost of R&D relief claims increasing but in relation to fewer claims being made for 2022-23. This implies HMRC’s compliance changes are discouraging claims that are less likely to be qualifying, especially those of lower value or in particular sectors.
NAO calls out HMRC for not having a strategic plan on tax evasion.
Record levels of tax relief claimed by the creative industries sector in 2023. The reliefs are now dominated by fewer, extremely large, claims for film and ‘high-end’ TV programmes. TaxWatch questions whether these reliefs offer good value for money given the profitability of expensive productions in light of changes to the Audio Visual Expenditure Credit.
Once again, the National Audit Office qualified HMRC’s accounts due to a “material level of error and fraud in Corporation Tax research and development reliefs”. Whilst the good news is that the estimated error rate within the relief is coming down it remains unacceptably high. It has taken years for HMRC to admit there were problems, despite plenty of warnings, and action has been too slow to avoid the situation getting totally out of hand.
TaxWatch analyses the latest tax gap data and examines manifesto pledges to narrow the gap to see whether they represent credible plans to increase tax revenues
TaxWatch analyses the latest Tax Gap publication, noting it has reached £40bn in 2022-23 yet still doesn’t cover offshore matters