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Corporation Tax Bill

The Bill is important because, as the Corporation Tax Act 2009, it will be the Act that students and practitioners will have to study in future. I hear the right hon. and hon. Members who point out that the Budget of 22 April will overtake some of the contents of the Act, as it is to become, but the Act will endure on the statute book and the Budget of 2009 will only make some changes to it. The procedure is unusual, as has been commented on. The Bill was referred to a Joint Committee on Tax Law Rewrite, which I chaired, of hon. Members of this House and Members of the other place. We received a memorandum from the tax law rewrite project team, to whom I join in paying tribute, and we took oral evidence from it. We satisfied ourselves that there had been extensive consultation with representative bodies, and we satisfied ourselves by inquiry that the 106 changes in tax legislation were properly accommodated. The legislation that we are considering is part of the rewrite of corporation tax law, income tax law having already been rewritten. As the Financial Secretary pointed out, the income tax legislation is in rewrite form, whereas the corporation tax legislation is now moving into rewrite form. A second corporation tax Bill is to come before us later this year, followed in due course by a further Bill to deal with international aspects of the law. This Corporation Tax Bill deals mainly with income, while the second one later this year will deal mainly with allowances. We on the Committee satisfied ourselves that the House of Commons would have the power to amend the legislation and the ability to scrutinise any changes that had occurred. We satisfied ourselves generally that the Bill should be passed by the House of Commons. I join my hon. Friend the Member for South-West Hertfordshire (Mr. Gauke) in saying that the emphasis among legislators and professionals is always to programme towards complexity, whereas the consumer's voice would no doubt plead for simplicity, if possible. I add my voice to my hon. Friend's in pleading for simplicity wherever possible. The hon. Member for Taunton (Mr. Browne) referred to the Bill's 1,330 clauses, 63 pages of contents, 174 pages of tables of origins and 196 pages of tables of destinations. I intend to submit it to the "Guinness Book of Records" as the longest Bill ever, a position that it has taken from the Companies Act 2006. There is, however, a rival: in 1821, this House passed an Act written on 757 membranes of vellum; it would have stretched for 348 m or 382 yd. I suppose one could claim that that Act holds the record, although I would maintain that, having been written on membranes, it is not entirely comparable. I confirm that the tax rewrite Committee carried out its duties in the proper form, and I join those who have spoken in this brief debate in commending the Bill to the House.