Board minutes - 7 October 2010

Present

Rt Hon Michael Jack – Chairman
John Whiting – Tax Director
Edward Troup – HM Treasury
Peter Michael – HM Revenue & Customs, standing in for Dave Hartnett

Secretariat

Jeremy Sherwood

Apologies

Dave Hartnett - HM Revenue & Customs.

1. Minutes of the last meeting

The minutes of the 13 September meeting were formally agreed.

2. Updates since the last meeting

Staffing: All three permanent civil servants were now in post. One part- time unpaid private sector secondee had been appointed and two more were due to join later in October. The names and seconding organisations would be announced on the OTS website shortly.
Consultative Committees: Invitations had been sent to prospective members of the two consultative/advisory committees being set up, one for each review. Both committees were due to meet for the first time on 3 November.
Small Business Tax Review: John Whiting and members of the secretariat had already met with a number of groups to discuss IR35 and small business taxation generally. The plan was now to arrange a series of events around the country in November and December to gather evidence of where the tax regime for small businesses was particularly complex or imposed burdens and costs. The OTS was also reviewing data HMRC held on the costs imposed by over 2,000 tax obligations on businesses.
OTS Website: At the moment the OTS website was being hosted by HM Treasury. The secretariat was exploring the possibility of an independent website with the Cabinet Office and the Central Office of Information.

3. Review of tax reliefs

The review’s terms of reference required the OTS to review a list of all reliefs, allowances and exemptions, applying to both businesses and individuals, within the taxes and duties administered by HM Revenue and Customs. The first task was clearly to draw together this list, and HMRC had been working with the OTS to bring this information together in one place. Whilst good progress had been made, this was, as anticipated, turning out to be a major task, and further work was needed to ensure the list was comprehensive.

There was a discussion around which reliefs, allowances and exemptions to include in the list. It would be important to apply the same definition consistently across the range of taxes being looked at. The Board asked the secretariat to aim to produce a list of reliefs and a high level strategy for reviewing the list in advance of the first meeting of the Consultative Committee for the review on 3rd November. Given the likely size of the list, it would be important to focus on what was achievable within the limited resources of the team, and the time available and this would be a good topic to discuss with the consultative committee.

4. Media strategy

The Board discussed how best to present the work of the OTS to the general and specialist media, especially around the time of publication of its interim and final reports. It would be important to raise the profile of tax simplification whilst managing expectations of radical change. A dedicated press officer loaned from HMRC for the equivalent of a day a week would help handle media requests for information around publication dates of the Office’s reports.

5. Date of next Board meeting

The Board agreed to meet next in mid-November, with a date still to be finalised.

6. AOB

Membership of OTS Board: The secretariat was asked to take forward the process of inviting two additional people to join the Board, with a background and interest in tax simplification.