Libdems demand investigation into HMRC tax credits
Party pressing the National Audit Office to review department’s recovery accounting
The National Audit Office has been asked to investigate HM Revenue and
Custom’s accounting for tax credits after it failed to reveal the amount of
overpaid credits it has recovered from families.
David Law, the shadow Liberal Democrat Work and Pensions Secretary wrote to
Comptroller and Auditor General Sir John Bourn after the Revenue said the
information is not kept because in-year recovery is considered ‘part of the
normal operation of the tax credit system’.
Laws said information on year-end recoveries showed an average of £1,028 is
being recovered from over a third of the two million families that claim tax
credits.
He said the issue of in-year recovery is important because rules limit recovery
only after year end. The Revenue’s behaviour is: ‘unacceptable because it is the
in-year recovery of overpaid tax credits that frequently causes the most
hardship, frustration and despair for recipients,’ Law added.