.png)
.png)
Two quotes for you this week. Number one: ‘Everyone can expect a very different experience from the one they receive today — it will be simple, personalised and secure, offering an increasing range of integrated services.’
Number two: ‘We expect everyone to comply with their tax obligations. As boring as it may be for some people, it is a chore you do have to do. If you are above the turnover threshold, it will be mandatory for you to do it. You will either have to grin and bear it, and do it yourself, or you will have to pay someone else to do it. We do hope that the software products will make this much easier for people than it would otherwise have been.’
Quite a change in tone. The first is from the ‘end of the tax return document’ from 2015 which announced making tax digital (MTD). The second is from HMRC chief executive Jim Harra’s evidence to the parliamentary Public Accounts Committee last week (tinyurl.com/2m2vf6m9) following the highly critical National Audit Office report on progress towards MTD.
I think the realism in that second quote is actually a step forward. The near-utopian vision of an effortless tax system set out in 2015 seemed idealistic and detached from reality. Even with the digital advances of the past eight years (ChatGPT anybody…) that vision still seems remote. So Jim Harra’s realism does come as something of a relief. Yes, anything that can be done to make tax filings more straightforward is to be welcome, but let’s not pretend that any time soon it will be a painless task. It is still going to be more like a trip to the dentist than a pleasant country walk.
If you do one thing...
Look at the research report on the hidden economy (tinyurl.com/2s4e52yj) – particularly the table on page 35 – quite an eye opener. It is extraordinary to me that people tell somebody in a survey that they are working in the hidden economy!
