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House of Lords (Members’ Taxation Status) Bill [HL]

moved, as an amendment to Amendment No. 3, Amendment No. 4: 4: Clause 1, line 4, leave out from ““Crown”” to end of line 5 The noble Lord said: While the first part of the amendment proposed by the noble Lord, Lord Goodhart, is understandable, the second part will make the Bill very difficult to administer. I can understand that a Member of the House of Lords employed by the Crown should be excused from the provisions of the Bill. I am sure that it is right and proper that those working for their country should not inadvertently get caught up in this legislation. But does the noble Lord realise what a Member of this House, "““employed … by an international organisation of which the United Kingdom is a member””" means? If he does, I suspect that he is on his own. On 27 February, Dr Howells, the Minister of State for the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, said: "““Comprehensive lists of both the international organisations of which the UK is a member, and bilateral treaties under which the UK has obligations, are not centrally held, and to draw up such lists would incur disproportionate costs””.—[Official Report, Commons, 27/2/06; col. 304W.]" In other words, no one has a clue how many international organisations the United Kingdom is a member of. If a Member of this House is sufficiently adept to organise his tax affairs in such a way as to avoid UK taxation on some or all of their income, I cannot believe that that individual would not be able to find employment, however nominal it might be, within one of the innumerable international organisations of which the United Kingdom is a member. From a purely practical point of view, the proposed exemption by virtue of being a member of an international organisation as described in the Bill creates a very grey area. There is, of course, another aspect. If a noble Lord is employed by an international organisation, then however honest and conscientious they may be, there must inevitably be a degree of responsibility to his or her paymaster. While I have the utmost faith in the ability of Members of this House to behave completely honourably, I am not certain that there should be a special position in Parliament as is proposed. This leads one to ask, as my noble friend Lord Selsdon suggested, to whom the Bill is designed to apply. Could it catch Members of this House who are giving valuable service and whose presence adds to the Chamber? If a noble Lord has so arranged his tax affairs to his best advantage—something entirely within the law—should this House then deprive itself of the contribution that that noble Lord makes, as my noble friend Lord Elton said? The Exchequer would not gain, but this House could lose. Of course, such a noble Lord could rearrange his affairs to fall outside the scope of the Bill, but there must be a high risk that he or she would be reluctant to pay to join the work that we do in this House, leaving us all the poorer. In fact, it makes one wonder whether there is any benefit at all to be gained from this Bill, however attractive it may appear at first sight. I beg to move.