Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the HM Revenue and Custom’s commissioned research conducted by Oxera on the impact employee share ownership schemes had on the productivity levels of UK firms.

The report “Tax-advantaged employee share schemes: analysis of productivity effects” was prepared for HM Revenue and Customs by Oxera and published in August 2007.

The research represents a valuable addition to the evidence base on employee share schemes, but there are important limitations to its scope. While the research uses real measures of company productivity, it does not take into account potential complementary effects or assess the effects of share schemes on other performance measures, such as staff turnover, or in achieving wider objectives such as promoting share ownership.