The Finance Bill Committee

4.28.07pm BST (GMT +0100) Wed 18th Jun 2008

The Finance Bill is of course the legislation which enacts the Government's tax proposals as laid down in the Budget. It is unusual because it does not go to the Lords for scrutiny and so the Committee stages are most important. The Committee, of which I am a member, sits for around ten hours a week in sessions scheduled for Tuesday and Thursday mornings and afternoons.

This year we have to consider over 160 clauses and around 40 schedules which will take some 25 sessions. The headline announcements at Budget time are now subjected to line by line scrutiny and as always the "devil is in the detail". This is no more evident than in the over 400 amendments submitted by the Government itself, to its own legislation. The opposition parties have also submitted hundreds of amendments but of course do not receive quite the same treatment. Not surprisingly, Government amendments are approved and opposition amendments are defeated. This is because the Labour contingent of the Committee adopts with a strong whipping system which ensures the Government always wins on the day. Even when they accept the arguments of the opposition their underlying amendment is still refused but often reappears as a "Government Amendment" later in the proceedings. This is just juvenile as quite obviously the Revenue and the Government are not the font of all wisdom they pretend to be. The procedures are time consuming and provide little real opportunity to improve the Bill so mistakes are made, anomalies created and not complexity not simplified.

Like much of Parliamentary procedure, it needs a complete overhaul, but in the meantime I try to use the time as productively as I can, pointing out the many weaknesses of the tax system.