Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, with reference to the document The future relationship between the United Kingdom and the European Union, page 49, paragraph 162, what preparations are being made to create an enforcement system to prevent the wrongful payment of tariffs; and how much the Government has allocated to fund those preparations.

Under the Facilitated Customs Arrangement, where there is a material risk of circumvention of the higher UK tariff, the UK would make it illegal to pay the wrong tariff.

To enforce this, HMRC would carry out risk-based and targeted checks across the country, rather than at the border, according to intelligence and threat assessment that draw on a variety of information sources. This would protect against fraud, ensure that the UK has an effective trade remedies regime and strengthen the UK’s position in trade negotiations.

HMRC has a strong track record in tackling all kinds of avoidance, evasion and non-compliance and already has an established approach to customs compliance involving pre and post clearance activity away from the border, and would use this approach for the Facilitated Customs Arrangement.

HMRC has been allocated £260m of funding in 2018-19 to support the department in preparing for departure from the EU. The finalised allocation for 2018-19 will be confirmed at Supplementary Estimates in early 2019.