§ 71. Mr. TOUCHEasked the Secretary to the Treasury if he is aware that in cases where investors received dividends and interest in 1914, subject to deduction of Income Tax at 1s. 4d., the rate passed in Committee of Ways and Means but subsequently altered in the Finance Bill to 1s. 3d., they are being called upon by the Inland Revenue to make payment of an additional 5d. in the £ (and not 4d.), so as to meet the subsequent increase in the rate for the year 1914–15 from 1s. 3d. to 1s. 8d., and to make a reclaim of the difference of 1d. by obtaining from the various companies or paying agents certificates that tax was deducted at 1s. 4d. instead of at 1s. 3d.; is he aware that a demand has been made for additional tax even in a case where the varying rates 1201 deducted during the year 1914–15 resulted in a total deduction in excess of 1s. 8d.; will he take into consideration that the method employed causes much inconvenience and trouble to all parties concerned, and must increase the work of the Inland Revenue authorities themselves; that in many cases it is practically impossible to produce certificates of deduction, as bankers follow the rule of issuing certificates only if asked for them when the coupons are presented for encashment; that it is the desire of customers to give the bankers as little trouble as possible at a time when they are working with greatly reduced staffs; that the procedure of the Inland Revenue would necessitate applications for certificates involving mere matters of pence in individual cases, but amounting to substantial sums in the aggregate; and will he consider the desirability of instructing the Inland Revenue authorities to obtain from the companies or paying agents supplying particulars of dividends or interest on which tax was not adjusted statements of the rate of tax actually deducted, and to claim from the recipients of the dividends only the actual amount required to adjust the tax to the basis of 1s. 8d. in the £?
§ Mr. MONTAGUThe course suggested in the last part of the question has been adopted by the Inland Revenue authorities, as far as practicable, but in a number of individual cases the information before them has not been sufficient to show whether or not the originally excessive deduction had subsequently been adjusted. If the hon. Member will give me particulars of any case in which the method employed in the collection of the additional duty causes disproportionate trouble, I will see whether the procedure cannot be simplified.