INCOME AND CORPORATION TAXES BILL [H.L.] (Hansard, 27 January 1970)

§ THE LORD CHANCELLOR
My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be now read a second time. Triplets! The Bill before the House whose Second Reading I am now moving is the Income and Corporation Taxes Bill. The next item on the Order Paper—quads if you include this!—is the "Taxes Management Bill. I think I told your Lordships on a previous occasion that the Law Commission had, very sensibly no doubt, asked the principal users of the Statute Book—namely, the Law Society—what were the subjects in which they would most like to see consolidation of our Statute Law. They, with a considerable degree of unanimity, said: one, income tax; two, the Rent Acts, and three, estate duty.
They in fact achieved, as your Lordships know, consolidation of all the Rent Acts, going right back to 1920—all those early Rent and Mortgage Interest Restrictions Acts—very much sooner than had hoped would be possible. As to the Income Tax Acts, I thought it was very doubtful whether we should be able to deal with them in this Parliament. I knew that last time the Income Tax Acts had been consolidated—namely, in 1952 —it had taken the draftsmen five years to do it. And, after all, the Law Commission did not start themselves until the summer of 1965. However, this Bill has been not, of course, the work of the Law Commission themselves but, I believe, primarily of the draftsman who is the usual draftsman of the Finance Acts. I suppose that nobody else would have had anything like the same knowledge. But it has now been done. I have tried to find somebody who has ever seen a larger Bill, but I have not succeeded. I am told that that applies also to the weight of the Bill.
This may suggest that as, if your Lordships give this Bill a Second Reading, it will go in the usual way to the Joint Committee on Consolidation Bills, it will present them with a formidable task. My Lords, I do net think so. I think that the noble Viscount, Lord Colville of Culross, is on the Joint Consolidation Committee, and he therefore probably knows more about their work than I do. 291 I think it represents a considerable burden to the Chairman, because I believe it is usual for the Chairman to go through the whole Bill with the draftsman. But the reason why I am hopeful that it will not take a great deal of time is that this is, after all, not a 1949 Act consolidation, with minor corrections and improvements; nor is it a consolidation with Amendments proposed by the Law Commission. It is the old straight consolidation which leaves the law exactly as it is now.
Unfortunately, the Chairman of the Joint Consolidation Committee, the noble and learned Lord, Lord Upjohn, has recently had an operation, and will not yet, I think, be able to start on the consolidation. However, I know that he is looking forward to doing so at a fairly early date. If possible, it will have to be completed by Budget Day because this is one of those instances—and there are other subjects to which the same thing applies—where one cannot consolidate the existing law just when it is in the process of being changed. One has to wait for what the draftsmen call "a gap".
My Lords, I think that no useful purpose would be served by my going through the 20 Parts of the Bill. It is the Bill that contains our substantive law. The Taxes Management Bill, which is the next item on the Order Paper, deals with the administration, with the general commissioners, the special commissioners, returns of income, assessment and collection of the tax. No doubt your Lordships will think it is a sensible division.
Before asking your Lordships to give this Bill a Second Reading I would make only one other observation, which those who come after me may remember. Having once done this, we must do it again every year, otherwise in seventeen years' time we shall be in exactly the same position as we are now in. There should be no difficulty about this. Australia, for example, has an annual Finance Act, and immediately afterwards the Income Tax Act is reconsolidated so that all the income tax and corporation tax law is always in one place. I beg to move.

VISCOUNT COLVILLE OF CULROSS
My Lords, I am sure that the Joint Com- 292 mittee on Consolidation Bills will get through this Bill. As the noble and learned Lord has said, it is a matter which to some extent has been forestalled by Amendments in the last Finance Act and is in a form where there can be a straight consolidation. I do not think that it will even be necessary to put the Question, That each clause shall stand part of the Bill, because that in itself would take quite a long time. The best news which the noble and learned Lord has given us is that this is to be a process of running consolidation. I was going to ask him about this because obviously it would be idiotic if, having done this work, we were to allow another gap of something like eighteen years to occur before it is done again. I myself never have to look at the Income Tax Acts for professional purposes. I have some other rather recondite books to look at, but not those. How anybody ever finds his way about them, unless he is a specialist in the existing legislation, I just do not know; and the introduction of this Bill must be a great step forward in the clarification of the law.

§ LORD MILNE
My Lords, I think it is fair to say that few in this House will comprehend, and still fewer outside will have had time to assimilate, the contents of this Bill. Therefore, I have followed —and I am sure this will apply to those outside—with great interest what the noble and learned Lord said in his introductory speech. Clearly, what is required is an assurance at some point that this and the next Bill are purely consolidation measures, and that the intention is that the law shall not be changed in any manner. From what I have heard of the noble and learned Lord's speech to-day, I think we have received this assurance. This is what is going to be studied by every student and every specialist in tax throughout the country. So all I need do is to say that I should like to be one among many others to congratulate this Government on producing this consolidation, and to express the hope that consolidation subsequent to each Finance Act will be carried out in future. I look forward next to the consolidation of the law of estate duty, but I think that will be a teaser.

§ THE LORD CHANCELLOR
My Lords, in reply to those observations may I give the assurance for which I was 293 asked. This is a straight consolidation; indeed, it is one of the functions of the Joint Consolidation Committee to give us that assurance when they report. I think I can say that estate duty consolidation is making quite good progress.