The Scotsman reports the following wrt money spent by the Scottish executive on a tax system that it has never used:
"MILLIONS of pounds from Scotland's budget were paid to HM Revenue and Customs to set up a tax system which was never used, it has emerged.
As a result of technology changes at HMRC, a Scottish government will have to fork out millions more if it wants to charge a different rate of tax.
The Scottish Parliament has never made use of its powers to vary the basic rate of income tax by 3p in the pound.
Sources say under an agreement which expired in 2007, the previous Scottish Executive paid HMRC £12 million to set up the necessary systems to identify Scottish taxpayers and a further £50,000 a year to maintain the project.
The current Scottish Government did not renew the agreement when it came to power in 2007 because it did not plan to use the powers.
Within the next few weeks, the UK Government is expected to publish the Scotland Bill, implementing proposals by the Calman commission to give Holyrood wider tax powers.
In the meantime, sources say there have been "significant changes to HMRC's IT platforms" which mean the Scottish Government would have to pay for completely new systems to identify Scottish taxpayers...."
Let's face it, politicians really do know f*ck things up and waste our money!
Tax does have to be taxing.
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HMRC probably gave the money to Mapley :)
ReplyDeleteThe Scottish Varible Rate was a non power, it would have killed any Scottish Administration stone dead because of a voter backlash. Also any money raised would have had the equal amount deducted from the Block Grant by Westminster it's a total waste of time
ReplyDeleteI agree with Anon @ 16 November 2010 23:13.
ReplyDeleteSo how about getting independence, send HMRC back over the boarder and sort out a simpler tax system that everyone can understand.
The signal for Scottish Variable Rate is still on the new, all-singing, all-dancing, all-ballsed-up PAYE system, so I assume it's there for some purpose.
ReplyDeleteMind you, none of the rest of it works, so why should that bit?