By singling out barbers and pipe fitters, HMRC shows it takes care of the little people, while Amazon looks after itself
'Public enemy No 1 is a Liverpool hairdresser… Or rather, in the interests of accuracy, he is only one master criminal on a list of nine coveted scalps.' Illustration by Matthew Richardson
Pondering one of the more delicious ironies of 20th century American justice, people always say wryly that they could only pin tax evasion on Al Capone. Pondering HM Revenue and Custom's 21st century name-and-shame list, they will say that they could only pin tax evasion on hairdressers.
If you have spent the past few months – or indeed decades – frothing with righteous indignation at the refusal of various major corporations profiting in the UK to pay so much as 37p in tax, let alone their fair share, you will be encouraged to learn that public enemy No 1 is a Liverpool hairdresser whom the Revenue eventually fined 17 grand for deliberate default. Or rather, in the interests of accuracy, he is only one master criminal on a list of nine coveted scalps. Others include a pipe fitter who settled with them for £10,986 and a Nottinghamshire knitwear firm that was eventually fined £86,765.54. The big kahuna is a wine firm from Mobberley in Cheshire. I'd quite like to see their thrilling stories told in a modern version of The Untouchables. As the Eliot Ness of the piece, the taxman ought to be played by a clean-cut do-gooder – Ryan Gosling perhaps – with Robert De Niro returning to take the role of the Fife grocer.
As so often in this septic isle, it's the pettiness of it all that's the tragedy. If these are the names, then the shame must be the Revenue's. Yet they seem to have trumpeted this exciting new direction in their tax-hunting activities with similar fanfare to that which must have attended the nailing of Capone. Ladies and gentleman … We got him.
Needless to say, this isn't a defence of the named and shamed, who are no doubt dreadful little chisellers. I'm afraid I'm one of those ineffably dreary sorts who doesn't pay cash in hand, gladly operates as well as submits to PAYE, and really can't be doing with tax avoiders at all. Blah, blah, blah. But for all my easy-won goody goody-ness, I pretty much need to know that every last megacorp doing business in our land has paid every last penny they owe before we start boasting about having nailed Cool Cutz, or Headmasterz, or whatever hair-based pun adorns this chap's salon lintel.
Predictably, this isn't the line HMRC's Treasury overlords have gone with, as Treasury minister David Gauke once again suggested that tax avoiders have nowhere to hide. (Except in plain sight, as some of Britain's most successful companies.)
Are you convinced by Mr Gauke? I can't help feeling that as a former corporate tax lawyer, married to a corporate tax lawyer, and a chap who used taxpayers' money for stamp duty on his second home move, he is somewhat miscast as the Simon Wiesenthal of hunting down tax avoiders.
I suppose he thinks getting on the airwaves to big up the HMRC list counts as Being Seen To Be Doing Something, as do his underlings in the Revenue themselves. Yet, as a piece of political theatre, this outing feels marginally less successful than Sooty and Sweep's production of One for the Road. There has been a huge and exhilarating outpouring of anger over tax avoidance over the past year, as the issue has moved closer to the centre of the stage than it has been in decades. To say that HMRC publishing a list of nine small businesses squanders that goodwill feels something of an understatement.
What is the intended message, if we may flatter the stunt in that way? That if HMRC look after the little people then the big people will look after themselves? You can't deny it's working. The big people seem to be looking after themselves very well indeed, and though this stunningly misdirected exercise stops just shy of congratulating the major multinationals who avoid tax, the indication of where the Revenue's focus lies effectively does just that.
If I were a mischievous billionaire I would stage a piece of political theatre myself. I would find out whichever hotshot tax lawyers act for Starbucks or Google, and hire them at vast expense to defend the likes of the pipe-fitter and the grocer. They'd end up getting a £300,000 rebate, which would make the point about the real problem more eloquently than Gauke and his cabinet seniors ever could. Certainly more than they'd ever care to, on this evidence.
As for the Revenue, it takes a special sort of flat-footedness to snatch defeat from the jaws of moral victory – but ultimately we must remember the calibre of the organisation with which we are dealing here. I merely pass on to you the tale of one self-employed friend, who was relentlessly pursued over a mystery cheque of around £2,750 that she had written and could not – a long time after the event – explain. She couldn't find the stub, the bank had somehow lost the details, and the investigating Revenue official was under the impression that she had written it as some kind of tax dodge. What kind was unclear, but he wanted to know what she was hiding. After two or three years of this, he brought his investigation to a graceless close. It had emerged that the cheque in question had in fact been paid to one HMRC, in settlement of income tax. Which should give the likes of Amazon a flavour of the worthiness of their foe.