Chamber and committees

I am glad that you look at it in defence procurement, because the costs for the Ajax project or for certain aircraft carriers have been billions of pounds higher than initially estimated. Of course, that was the case with HS2 as well. All those major projects seem to be hugely over budget.

Incidentally, does the OBR ever look at the price of procurement in the UK relative to other parts of Europe? All capital projects seem to be phenomenally more expensive in the UK than they are in Europe, for example.

Thank you for that clarification.

My last question is on the information on page 38 of the resource accounts document, which is on performance analysis. I was pleased to see that, between 2016 and 2022, the 10 categories that you have, from “Leading and Managing Change” through to “Engagement Index”, have all improved significantly. However, there is variation in improvement. For example, you are sitting at 61 per cent for “Pay and Benefits”, compared with 92 per cent for “My Team”. I am not really sure what “My Team” relates to. Can you explain that graph and set out the progress that has been made and that you plan to make?

Okay. I have hogged the floor enough. I open up the session to colleagues.

I asked about it because the tax gap is one of the contentious issues. I was looking for a ballpark figure; I was not looking for you to say that it is £10.3 million or £4.5 million. Is it about 1 or 2 or 3 per cent? If we do not know what the gap is, it is hard to tackle it. I know from your accounts that more than 99 per cent of the money that is due is being collected, but it seems to me that there might be a gap outside of that.

That is great. Indeed, that, in itself, is a very helpful comment.

Thank you for answering our questions so fully and frankly. There is one issue that you said that you would get back to us on, so we look forward to receiving that information.

That concludes the public part of today’s meeting, as our next agenda item is discussion of our work programme, which will take place in private.

So you are hoping for further progress, and are planning for and working towards that.

Our accountant, John Mason, is waiting to come in after I am finished.

The work that you are doing on compliance activity brought in some £10.4 million, but I note an increase in the total amount of penalties and interest collected in the current year of £2.065 million, compared with £1.245 million the preceding year. Can you clarify the reason for such a significant jump?

Excuse me, but I notice that you are looking at John Mason even though he did not ask the question.

On you go then.