§ Mr. Leeasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer what is his estimate of the amounts of corporation tax written-off as irrecoverable in the years 1975, 1976 and 1977; and what criteria are applied by his Department when any decision is made not to persevere with the collection of assessed corporation tax.
§ Mr. Denzil DaviesTax is written off as irrecoverable when it remains unpaid after all the possibilities of collection action have been exhausted. The total corporation tax so written off for the accounting years 1975 and 1976 was £2.2 million and £3.9 million; the corresponding figure for the accounting year 1977 is estimated to be about £6.7 million. In the great majority of cases the insolvency of the company was the reason for corporation tax being irrecoverable.