No place for marketed avoidance schemes, says CIOT

In response to HMRC’s consultation on closing in on promoters of tax avoidance the CIOT agrees with a robust approach toward marketed tax avoidance schemes but highlights concerns around the creation of new strict liability criminal offences which remove the requirement to prove dishonest intent and could affect the rule of law ‘where government officials have the de facto power to decide what is and what is not a criminal act without any external scrutiny’.

The response calls for increased transparency in HMRC’s internal governance processes particularly regarding the issuance of stop notices and the deployment of the universal stop notice to safeguard against potential misuse of the powers.

A key concern is around the introduction of a new DOTAS hallmark specifically to target disguised remuneration schemes given that promoters are unlikely to disclose in the first place. ‘On its own the introduction of a new DR...