Spuddo presents us with the govt estimates for fraud. The table he uses says, at the bottom:
Figures for HMRC and DWP include internal fraud and error only. Tax and Welfare fraud figures are collected and reported separately by HMRC and DWP.
Spuddo then asks:
There are so many questions that this poses. First, how are the figures for HMRC so utterly inconsistent with the tax gap?
The answer being that this is not an estimate of the tax gap. This is, instead, the estimate of what his union friends within HRMC are stealing or losing to their own error. This being what the table says the figures are.
Not even reading your own evidence, eh? What a justification of three professorships that is.
Between stealing all private pensions and ISAs you’d think the guy would have enough in his proposals but no – more grift and ‘moar tax.’
A quote comes to mind from my teenage years – a description of the WWF Wrestler ‘Seargant Slaughter’ when he became a pro Saddam Hussein heel during Gulf War One- could be applied to Murphy.
‘What a despicable piece of garbage!’
‘
Figures for HMRC and DWP include internal fraud and error only.
Presumably they mean ‘represent’ rather than ‘include’. A speed-reading genius might misunderstand but anyone who goes on to read the next sentence will work out what is intended but the footnote is badly written.
It strikes me that fraud and error could easily be reduced by having a much simpler tax system. I wonder if he’d be keen on that.