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Finance (No. 2) Bill

Unfortunately, I cannot do so, because, as a result of data protection legislation, I do not have the names and addresses of the people to whom the practice has been writing. I am sure that other organisations are willing to offer a cheaper service, but the review charge calculated by the Society of Trust and Estate Practitioners is £341 rather than £347, so anyone who wants to take professional advice must incur a significant fee, which, because it is subject to VAT, will generate substantial revenue to the Chancellor. Some 1 million to 1.5 million such arrangements may need reviewing, which would generate roughly three times the revenue for the Treasury that the Paymaster General has indicated. The retrospective nature of the legislation raises a more fundamental issue, which is the credibility of the UK as an appropriate place for people with assets to invest or to seek to conduct their business. For many years, it has been an important tenet of tax legislation that retrospective legislation is not encouraged. Because this provision has been introduced with no consultation whatsoever with the industry, it fundamentally undermines this country’s long-established reputation for fairness in its taxation dealings. I urge the Paymaster General to consider whether it is worth putting at risk this country’s reputation among the wealthy and, in particular, the wealthy from overseas who might want to live here and do business here, by leading such people to think that long-established provisions on tax can be changed without consultation at the drop of a hat on a retrospective basis.