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Finance (No. 3) Bill

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that intervention. I am trying hard not to let the award go to my head. I will endeavour to do my best, but it is of course a great honour. I take it as praise for what the Government are doing more generally on tax policy. Before I break into tears—I find it quite emotional to talk about the award—I shall return to the issue of mutual assistance. HMRC's data-gathering powers are modernised by clause 86 and schedules 23 and 24. It is important that the powers satisfy the international standards determined by the OECD and the global forum on transparency and exchange of information for tax purposes. The provisions in the Bill, which have been discussed in Committee, will ensure that HMRC can use its full range of existing powers to meet requests from overseas. The global forum is currently conducting a peer review of the UK and a specific issue has been identified that we have to address. Schedule 36 to the Finance Act 2008 does not allow HMRC to require information from a third party when it does not know the full identity of the taxpayer but has some information from which their full identity can be ascertained, such as a branch code and a bank account number or a credit card number. At present, unless a serious loss of tax is suspected, HMRC is unable to issue a notice to a third party that can be reasonably expected to know the name and address of the person concerned. In the examples I have given, that would be a bank or credit card issuer. To meet our international commitments, we need to amend schedule 36 to allow a formal notice to be issued in those circumstances. However, we have made a clear commitment to consult on tax changes, so I have asked HMRC to consult over the summer on how best to achieve the changes, with a view to publishing draft provisions in the autumn and legislating next year. I envisage the changes taking effect from Royal Assent in 2012. In conclusion, the amendments to clause 87 and schedule 25 will help to ensure that the new mutual assistance recovery directive is fully transposed into UK law by 31 December 2011. We fully support the aims of the directive and this implementing legislation. I therefore commend the amendments to the House.