Fri, 1 Apr 2011

Revenue IT partner fails to give evidence

The chair of the All Party Parliamentary Group on Taxation has accused HM Revenue & Custom’s IT partner of being ‘scurrilous’ and a ‘disgrace’, after it refused to appear before the All Party Parliamentary Group on Taxation.

Ian Liddell-Grainger MP said in an interview with Payroll World (see page 20) that the IT giant, Capgemini, had declined an invitation to meet with the group unless it first obtained permission from the chancellor, George Osborne. ‘It is a disgrace that a major IT firm is prepared to go behind the skirts of the chancellor to protect its contract. It makes me wonder what is wrong with the contract,’ he said.

Capgemini had also been invited to give evidence to the Public Administration Select Committee (PASC) but declined this invitation as well. Liddell-Grainger said ‘I had a meeting with Bernard Jenkin [the PASC chair] who was quite concerned and wanted to pick my brain. I said, “Well I’m afraid I think you’ll have to order them to come in front of you. And use, if necessary, your powers of privilege”.’

However, a clerk for the committee said: ‘Capgemini told us that nobody was free on the date when the evidence session was being scheduled. No mention was made of needing Mr Osborne to agree to their appearance.‘

He added: ‘The invitation was sent at quite short notice and a number of other organisations we tried to contact also had diary clashes’.

A spokesperson for Capgemini told Payroll World: ‘Capgemini has attended the APPG tax sessions in the past, but was unable to attend the meeting in March. MPs’ requests for private meetings with Capgemini covering the Aspire contract and HMRC must be made through the office of the exchequer secretary to the Treasury, and Capgemini is required to follow this protocol.’

Liddell-Grainger said he was also concerned about the length of time Capgemini had kept its contract with the Revenue. ‘We have a system which has taken 10 years to get to this stage and it doesn’t do the job yet - which is to produce RTI,’ he said.

The APPG chair also insisted the group was not interested in ‘doing anyone over’ in raising these concerns. ‘We just want to check that the contract is the best value for money, for HMRC but also for the public – if it is the right deal then we’ve no interest in changing anything,’ he said.