Taxpayers' awareness of making tax digital for income tax

For some extraordinary reason the results of a recent survey into taxpayer readiness for making tax digital (MTD) for income tax brought to mind the 2007 ‘Comic Relief’ sketch when Lauren Cooper (Catherine Tate) met Tony Blair. All the hype on one side but zero interest on the other.

About a quarter of taxpayers interviewed in the research carried out by IPSOS were described as ‘capable but disengaged’ and frankly that is not surprising. In fact when I say all the hype is on one side – HMRC’s – I say that advisedly. Accountancy and tax bodies and the tax press are of course well informed and involved in the process but many of the taxpayers who will have to operate MTD for IT have not got a clue and I suspect have relatively little interest. They are not helped...