Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, if he will bring forward legislative proposals to ban auditors from selling tax avoidance schemes to their audit clients.

The new EU Audit Regulation (537/2014) prohibits the provision of tax services by audit firms to their audit clients. This includes services relating to tax avoidance. The prohibition will apply where those audit clients are banks, building societies, insurers and issuers of shares or debt securities on a regulated market in the EU (e.g. the main market of the London Stock Exchange). The Regulation was agreed by the European Parliament and the Council in 2014 and will apply from 17 June 2016.