Speeches by Murray.

“That is a good point. As we know, HMRC is a statutory supervisor within the regulations. It supervises around 36,000 businesses. It has quite a significant role to play there. One of the questions for me is making sure that HMRC continues to regularly check the resourcing levels for its role in anti-money laundering to…”

“HMRC, it is probably worth saying, has a tremendous amount of data. In conversations I have with other Government Departments, there is a great desire to use HMRC data for other goals. There are protocols about what data you can share. There are legal gateways about what basis you can share it on, but I very strongly s…”

“This review might have been before my time.”

“That is an interesting point. Certainly, in terms of any new systems or new ways we are interacting with taxpayers, part of the process is to digitalise what exists already. Anything new would be digital by default. That data collection would be expected to be at the best possible level. We need to think about what dat…”

“The crucial bit of data in that decision was about claims. When I am discussing this in other debates in the Commons, there is a point to be made about the difference between the value of farms and the value of claims. That is where some of the confusion has arisen in terms of people thinking there is data that says di…”

“It was not with my chair of the board hat on. It was a ministerial consultation, but when that decision went public and everyone around this table knew about it my involvement was in the past. As soon as it is public, it is all signed off by everyone including the PM.”

“It starts in April 2026, so that will be set out ahead of then. I very much expect it to be digital.”

“It is not online. There will be some questions to answer. We can assume that it will be a digitally-led process for registration, but I can update the Committee in due course about what we are considering in terms of minimising the burden, while also making sure it is an effective process.”

“Thanks very much, Chair, for having me today. If I set the context of when I was appointed, under Rachel Reeves as Chancellor, we had some very clear priorities for HMRC, which I am sure I will come to later in the session today. I was determined to drive those changes through the organisation at HMRC. I know that diff…”

“It is a different job. The role that Jayne-Anne Gadhia plays is a fantastic benefit to HMRC. She brings a huge amount of experience, counsel and advice for me. Her staying on as the lead NED has been really important.”

“I wanted to reform the board around our priorities as an incoming Administration.”

“I wanted to ensure that the priorities that I have on behalf of the Government, Ministers and the new Administration were transmitted as directly as possible through to HMRC to deliver that.”

“I have to be slightly careful because civil servants, rightly, do not tell me exactly what previous Ministers’ relationships were like with HMRC. My impression of it is that Ministers have been, certainly in recent years, much more arm’s length with HMRC. There is an issue here where the principle of taxpayer confident…”

“No, because that is with my hat on as Exchequer Secretary. As a Minister, I would have a role in setting the general direction of HMRC. Ultimately, the backstop is that Ministers can issue directions to HMRC. That is never needed, hopefully, because the backstop is that directions can be issued, which means that, on a …”

“Ultimately, I am held to account by the people of this country and the voters. As a Government, we are held to account for whether we deliver. We were elected to deliver.”

“Ultimately, it has always stopped with Ministers. The way to make sure that you can not only make clear that accountability line but use the relationship between the Minister and HMRC to deliver change is by making sure that it is less arm’s length than it has been in the past.”

“When I was at City Hall, we delivered the affordable homes programme there. A lot of that was around unblocking individual housing developments in London and working with third parties in the private sector to ensure that our policies were ones that would work and support the private sector to play its role in what we …”

“Ultimately, it would always be the Minister. The buck stops with Ministers. That has always been the case, but I am very happy to make that clear.”

“That is one way of phrasing it.”

“I actually do not see it as twice over. I disagree with your analysis, because I do not think that the chair of the board has ever actually been responsible, because the board is non-executive in its nature.”