YOU COULDN'T MAKE THIS GUY UP: DAVID HARTNETT, PRIZE TUBE

The UK tax row has just gone from ridiculous to idiotic by way of farcical.

It started off badly with a supposedly sophisticated western country admitting that its tax was all to hell and that millions of people had over or underpaid tax in the last few years. It got worse as the week went on with interviews with tax staff saying that no one had the foggiest idea what was happening, the computers couldn’t cope with the work required, there were too few staff to answer inquiries and in general the department was a complete car crash. (I know what they are like from experience ... and the word “nightmare” would be a distinct compliment.)

When at last we got someone from management to put his head above the parapet, it was a jumped up civil servant suit, who was “supposed” to be in charge of the Revenue, and I use the word “supposed” advisedly, He gave an interview to the Money Box programme on Radio 4 and made a monkey of himself in the process . In his interview he point blank refused to apologise to his employers ... us... for the completely cack handed way he has run his department in our tax office despite his £160,000 salary and gold plated pension. He also said that people who owed over £2,000 would be required to pay it back within three months (remembering that those who could not would be charged interest at 10 times the Bank of England’s base rate.)

Finally, with his backside red from the kicking that Osborne gave him, he has apologised. I’ve got very little time for Osborne, who seems to be utterly unaware that there are people in this country who can’t whip ten grand out of their back pockets to repair a restaurant that their kid has trashed, but it seems that this time the PR people have told him what a disaster the muppet from the Revenue had made of himself and that people were being rendered speechless with rage by him... and he has acted.

The muppet in question, Mr Hartnett, Dave to his friends, who is 59 and will probably retire shortly with a multi-million pound unfunded pension of our money, issued a statement. After seeing “no need to apologise”, suddenly he has become “deeply sorry”.

But just to show that they haven’t REALLY learnt their lesson, a spokesman for the Revenue said that Dave was sorry his apology did not come across in the Money Box interview. I suggest a little lesson in communications Dave. If you want to get across a message that you are sorry, it probably best to avoid the words “I, don’t , see, why, I, should and apologise” in that order.

What a bunch of complete and utter incompetents run this country. And we pay them more than we pay the First Minister or the Prime Minister.


It is high time that people like him got the sack for running a shambles of a department in a developed country.

Pics: Dave on the floor at what looks like the Mecca Bingo or a bordello or something of that ilk. And Mr Osborne telling him to buck up... or something that sounds a bit like that.

IF YOU HAVE BEEN HIT BY THE TAXMAN, MUNGUIN'S GOT THE ANSWER......

A couple of days ago I wrote about Revenue and Customs’ new computer having made a mess of the tax of millions of people.

The Daily Telegraph has prepared a letter with the aid of its legal experts which, if you are one of the unlucky ones, I hope you will find useful.

Clearly Munguin’s Republic takes no responsibility for the likely reply of “sod off and pay up” that you will probably get.!!

Dear Sir,

I have received your tax calculation for the tax year [enter year(s) here].

You will appreciate that your letter came as a shock to me. I had every reason to suppose that my tax affairs were in order. I had thought that all the tax that I was due to pay was deducted under PAYE. I believe that the underpayment has arisen because you failed to take action upon relevant information already in your possession for the year(s) in question.

Then, if you owe money from the 2008/09 tax year, use this:

You are asking me to pay tax in respect of the year to April 5, 2009. It is therefore more than 12 months since the end of that tax year. Therefore, I believe that I am entitled to make a claim under Extra Statutory Concession A19 for this tax to be waived. I feel that you failed to make proper use of the facts you had been given about my sources of income. You allowed the arrears to build up by failing to make proper and timely use of information that you had been given.

Or, if you owe money from the 2009/10 tax year, use this:

You are asking me to pay tax in respect of the year to April 5, 2010. You may have informed me of the arrears within 12 months of the tax-year ending, but I feel that the ‘exceptional circumstances’ condition of Extra Statutory Concession A19 applies to me because you failed to make proper use of the facts you had been given about my sources of income.

Then, finally:

Payment of this tax would represent a significant hardship to me whether as a direct payment or through an adjustment to my notice of coding next year. I am therefore requesting that under the provisions of ESC A19 the whole of the underpayment as shown on the P800 should be remitted.

I look forward to hearing from you.

Yours faithfully

Bonne chance mes braves!!

AMATEURS AT THE TAX OFFICE ...

Why on Earth does everything in this country have to be so complex?

First issue that I can remember was the Child Support Agency. It was set up in the 90s (with huge support from a public that was sick to the back teeth of picking up the bill for lads whose idea of a good time was a quick one on and Friday night, and whose idea of a bad time was any resultant kind of reduction in their beer, cars and clothes budget). But it was made so complex, and made so many errors, that in the end the public was sick to the back teeth of it.

Then there was the (again) well meaning child tax credits. No one, not matter how anti Labour could say that it wasn’t a good idea to target the very limited amount of money on the poorest. It was of course, as was family tax credit, a subsidy to employers, and thus to jobs. But once again it was so complex that it caused more grief than it gave comfort, and people were terrified of it, lest there be an over payment, which there frequently was, and it be taken back.

Now it’s the PAYE system. It seems that few in the Revenue really understood much of what they were doing. It appears that there is likely to be an overhaul of the way that tax is calculated which probably means that once completed, no one will understand what they are doing; the computers won’t be able to cope with it and the whole system will collapse.

This latest mess means that the wrong tax has been taken from around 1.4 million people. Some have paid too much, some too little. Those who have overpaid will receive an average rebate of just over £400 which will be paid to them by cheque.

Those who have been underpaying (around 1.4 million) will, have to pay money back. The amount will be taken in installments from their pay. The average amount is likely to be around £1200 and this will be taken at about £100 a month. Tax codes for next year will be altered to ensure the money is recouped over a year. Nippy at a time when prices are likely to rise steeply and salaries are likely to be static unless you are among the top earners..

Knowing my luck, and based on my past experience with HMIR, I will get a bill for 3 times my annual income and they will refuse to accept that they could possibly be wrong. The last debacle with them took enough phone calls to pay the BT chairman’s bonus.

The coalition has blamed the labour government, not unreasonably since they were in charge during the period when it happened.


According to the Daily Telegraph a Treasury source said: “A decade of meddling and intervening made the tax affairs of millions of families and businesses across the UK extremely complicated.”

So no bias there from the Treasury!

Ministers say that the Government is now using a computer system which can match taxpayers’ records up automatically and make sure the right amount of tax has been paid. So...we now have a government computer that does what it’s supposed to do......?

Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ..... when will they lose all the discs then?

Pic: Clever crest concocted by mehrdad in light of IR,s lost cds back in 2007. The crest is changed to include a cd carried by the lion and the unicorn under the crown and the text changed from the original "Dieu et mon droit" (God and my right) to "Deux cds sont perdus" (two cds have been lost). It is copyright www.aref.adib.com, and I hope they will excuse my non-commercial use of it. It sums the department up pretty well.

MPs DON'T WANT TO FUND THE "INDEPENDENT" COMMITTEE THAT TRIES TO STOP THEM FIDDLING....

Well...would you look at the expression on that little piggy’s face.

The angry and defiant look from Mr Woolas, or Wool Ass as I prefer to call him is, it seems, directed at the new parliamentary expenses agency. Perhaps they have refused him his wife’s cosmetics, blouses and underwear on his expenses.

According to the Telegraph, disgruntled MPs have threatened to bring down the new supposedly independent allowances watchdog in protest at being treated like ordinary human beings and not the gods they think they are.

Now when I say it is independent, I use the word loosely because the MPs have to vote for its funding. They have already had some of the rules changed because it took time for them to get their money..... and they are not like ordinary people and have to make arrangements to suit when public bodies mess them around.

So members of the Speaker’s committee refused to sign off on the budget for the Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority (IPSA) and demanded officials provide new information before they would agreed to fund the body, raising the prospect that it will not be able to continue.

That’s the way to do it guys. I wish I could just refuse to fund the Revenue or Jobcentre Plus or DVLA or TV Licencing.... or whoever happens to be making a mess of my finances this week. Come to that I wish I could stop financing the Royal Bank!

MPs crowded the committee room and shouted and barracked the staff of the IPSA as they answered questions. (It’s nice to know that they can get really worked up about something, isn’t it?) and one was heard to shout “Bastards”, perhaps after a particularly liquid lunch, possibly on expenses, so it’s good to know that our representatives are showing our kids a good example on the behaviour front.

Presumably they will be fighting with equal vigour the next time that one of their constituents gets done over by some public body. Or maybe they’ll just yawn and pass the letter over to some clerk to deal with.

Bob Russell, LibDem, called the organization the most inefficient he had known in 40 years of public office. He should get out more. Really!

Nick Brown, Labour Chief Whip, indicated that there were no satisfied MPs... Well of course there aren’t, you balloon. No one who has had an open cheque book for years and years is ever happy with being kept in check! People like Winterton resigned because of it.

Charles Walker, Conservative, accused IPSA of wasting money after a compliance officer was appointed to investigate questionable claims. Erm, Charlie, don’t we have the same sort of thing on TV Licences, Tax, Social Security? Aren’t there snoopers all over the country making sure that we stump up and don’t cheat? Why would you be different?

On the basis that evidence turned up by the Daily Telegraph showed that over 50% of your number cheated on their expenses and took what was not there (in other parlance stole), I think it’s not unreasonable that you should be treated just like ordinary mortals.

A word of warning: don’t try to mess with this committee you set of conniving, dreary little cheats. We’re angry. You should know that. We haven’t forgotten. We are all suffering hardships to pay back for the incompetences of the last few years. Don’t add insult to our injury by continuing to assume that you are above it all. That would be really foolish.


Pics: Phil Woolas, Joanna Lumley's doormat, a collection of MPs, and Charles Walker who clearly has been off planet over the last year or so... out to lunch maybe (they have long lunch breaks in parliament)?

THE COMPLETELY EXPECTED HITS YOU BETWEEN THE EYES

Surprise, Surprise.

A new computer system at the Inland Revenue has resulted in mistakes in tax deductions for tens for thousands of people, many of whom have been left out of pocket until the money can be refunded. Pensioners, whose tax codes are complex, are as you might expect, among those worst hit.

People have had their personal tax allowances removed and been placed on higher tax codes or even had a '1' inserted in front of their salary, putting their taxable income by £100,000.

The Revenue has also admitted its call centres are "exceptionally busy" and that callers "are finding it difficult to get through to an adviser" and some have been disconnected before they can report their problems. Nice service guys. That’s what we pay you for NOT. Note to George....Sort it!

Although the problem first came to light in January, so it can hardly be blamed on the current government, HMRC has never publicly disclosed how many people had been affected. However, it is now reckoned that there could be up to 100,000 people affected in total.

Despite the awful service from the call centre, employers are still being advised that if they have enquiries from employees or pensioners about this to ask them to contact the Revenue in the usual way,....so that they can be ignored, or rather cut off after they have struggled through countless mechanical exercises in getting to the correct destination.

HMRC said that more customers had been contacting them because they wanted to query the coding used in their April pay packets. Noooooo, surely not?

They said: "We are aware that some customers, because of the increase in demand, are finding it difficult to get through to an adviser and we apologise for this and are doing all we can to meet the need.

"Inevitably at busy times we may be unable to answer all our calls. We are working hard to maintain a good customer service. We know, for instance, that some customers have been frustrated by being disconnected after they have been through the … messaging system, but before they speak to an adviser. We are now taking new measures to help prevent this from happening."

Actually it’s not really “inevitable” at all, and I can’t see why they think it would be. They knew about this mistake in January. They might reasonably have expected that if they didn’t fix it by April there would be a high demand for their service from confused, frustrated and sometime seriously worried “customers” or taxpayers as ordinary people would call them. So really the only inevitability is that they could expect one hell of a lot of complaints.

It begs the question ... why didn’t they prepare for this....?

The problem, needless to say, comes from the introduction of a new system, which combines information on National Insurance contributions and Pay As You Earn (PAYE) for the first time. But in some cases the system has incorrect information about earnings, meaning some people incorrectly being placed in the wrong tax band.

HMRC admitted the number affected was unknown because staff were not recording how many cases they had dealt with. Or maybe they just don’t want us to know how badly they have messed up...

I’ve dealt with the Revenue and frankly it gets about 6 out of 10 for politeness. but 2 out of 10 for reliability. My experience was that nothing gets done till you push and push and get cross. Then it gets done wrong and you have to start all over again.

I wish the people who have been wrongly coded the very best of luck in trying to get it sorted. They'll surely need it.

A JOB A DAY KEEPS THE TAXMAN AT BAY

Danny Alexander may well have the record for the shortest time spent as a Secretary of State for Scotland; however it is possible that his tenure of the post of Chief Secretary at the Treasury will be even shorter.

It appears that Mr Alexander, whilst not having broken any laws (no pun intended), has been morally rather less than we would have hoped for in a Cabinet minister concerning his tax affairs.

According to the Daily Telegraph, which now sees its mission as the cleaning up of politics and the outing of anyone who has been less than 100%, our Danny has been using that old ploy of first home to the tax people (so no capital gains tax) and second home to the Commons, (so oodles of expenses to do the place up so that it could be sold at a vast profit). Read all about it here.

The tax avoidance, whilst technically not illegal, puts him in the same sort of situation as the deeply unlikeable Hazel Blears, who when caught red handed, owing around £13,000 to the Inland Revenue, paid up with great ceremony waving her cheque and grinning like she was some sort of heroine.

What I find deeply concerning is that David and Nick don’t seem to have looked very far into the financial affairs of their chief secretaries. Nor does the Liberal Whips Office seem to have been particularly smart over it.

Nick Clegg very specifically said that that no Lib Dem MP profited from the expenses system. It seems that he didn’t actually check that fact before he made the statement.

I am not calling for his resignation, but it if it were me, I’d be gone by now out of sheer embarrassment!

PROSECUTIONS ON THE CARDS? OR WILL PIGS FLY!

At last! It seems that the police have decided to pass their files on 3 noble Lords and 3 honourable members to the Crown Prosecution Service, the English equivalent of the Procurator Fiscal. It is expected that a decision on whether to prosecute or not will be made by England’s top prosecutor, Keir Starmer in January, well in advance of the General Election.

The three peers are: Lord Clark of Hampstead, a former Labour Party chairman, who apparently has admitted a “terrible mistake” by claiming overnight expenses when he was in fact going home, or staying with friends (How can you make a mistake over that; didn’t he know where he was staying?); Lady Uddin, who lived in London but claimed that her main home was an unfurnished flat in Maidstone, thus netting over £100,000; and Lord Hanningfield, who also managed to claim £100,000 for overnight stays, when in fact he went home to Essex in a chauffeur driven car provided by the taxpayer, in his role as chairman of Essex County Council. How confused must he have been after a hard day’s work in the bar, sorry, I mean the Lords?

The honourable members are: Elliot Morley, who claimed for a mortgage he didn’t have; David Chaytor, who did the same; and our own Jim Devine, of dubious shelves and even more dubious rewiring fame.

Police appear to have ruled out taking any action over flipping of houses, or avoidance of Capital Gains Tax, which seems incredibly generous of them, given that millions of pounds of taxpayers’ money was lost. It seems, however, that the Inland Revenue is looking into 27 (only 27?) claims for items not considered to be vital in the carrying out of parliamentary duties, with a view to charging 40% tax on their value. One can only imagine that this must include the duck house and the moat cleaning, not to mention the bath plug. I’m sure small businessmen will be delighted at this new, much more generous regime over small matters of tax irregularities.

It is good to hear that some investigations are being carried out, but bad to hear that there are so few. It was also disappointing to hear that no legislation would be introduced to deal with MPs’ expenses in the parliamentary year to come. I would have thought that, given the shortness of legislative time, the importance to the reputation, both here and abroad, of the so-called mother of parliaments, and the public’s obvious fury, Brown might have thought it prudent to include this in yesterday’s speech. New MPs in a new parliament in June of 2010 must start with a clean slate and a new system that we can have some faith in. What do you think are the chances of that?

Update: According to the BBC's World at One, Christopher Kelly has put pressure on the Prime Minister to ensure that legislation is introduced to enact the recommendations in his report. In one of their swiftest U-turns yet, Downing Street seems to have agreed that this may well be done. I wonder!