Four other people tried to commit suicide in connection with the loan scandal, which left tens of thousands of entrepreneurs faced with huge tax invoices that their employers should have paid, Sky News learned.
The HMRC made 17 references to the police watchdog (independent office for the conduct of the police) on suicide attempts of 14 people, against 13 references of 10 people previously known in October 2023.
The figures, revealed in response to a request for freedom of information by Sky News, come Above the 10 known suicides Among the persons taken in the controversial tax repression, which alarmed the deputies through the political spectrum.
Loan costs have been announced in George Osborne Budget 2016 and made the freelancers responsible for years of retrospective income and national insurance tax after being paid for their loan wages.
Former Conservative Chancellor George Osborne
The HMRC was accused of having harassed ordinary people victims of poorly sold because the arrangement was widely promoted by lawyers, accountants and tax professionals in the 2000s and 2010s.
The workforce was launched An independent examination in politics But the activists described him as “whistling” and “concealment” because he does not look at the principle of loan costs, only means of making people settle down.
“Trapped in an endless nightmare”
The father of three, Ray Newton, is a thousand people who paid an umbrella company to manage his costs while working as a computer entrepreneur for Barclays Bank from 2009 to 2010.
They paid him in insurance franchise loans that he was “completely above the edge”, but in 2016, he was struck by an unexpected HMRC bill of £ 16,000.
Ray Newton faced requests from nearly £ 60,000 of HMRC
Ray reimbursed him, but last year, he suddenly faced requests for £ 15,000 income tax and £ 14,000 of interest which had accumulated all the time without his knowledge. The “bomb invoice” also included £ 12,000 tax on successions on loans despite their classification as a salary.
“Instead of going for the tax that has been avoided, they opt for the jugular,” said Ray, 70.
The bill arrived in the post after eight years of sporadic letters of the HMRC saying that Ray still needed to settle but not to explain why or how much, often ignoring him when he wondered. It almost destroyed him.
Ray tried to commit suicide on the stress of loan costs
“I literally begged – please tell me what I owe. It made me look like a bad person … My wife left me and I really became in a state about it, “he said.
“I had advice, I was on antidepressants, I was on sleeping pills. You know, my whole world was sort of collapsing. It was like being trapped in an endless nightmare.
“I tried to commit suicide but I was arrested by a member of the public.”
Ray is now in a better place and is back with his wife, while HMRC recently agreed that the inheritance tax is not due and giving it misleading or incorrect information.
But it is skeptical about the review.
“The government cannot afford or does not want to afford the implications of an appropriate investigation. It will be a whitening. “
The HMRC says that it takes seriously the well-being of all taxpayers and undertakes to identify and support customers who need additional help with their tax cases. He indicates that he has made significant improvements to this service in recent years.
Sky News spoke to several victims of loan accusations who said that even if they had not disputed the taxes due to the chaotic communication of the HMRC making the adjustment and the passage more difficult.
“The impact was devastating”
For the father of two children, Stephen Bishop, the long trained battle contributed to the rupture of his marriage and led him to express suicidal thoughts.
He was told to join a loan program by the company that has hired him and has since faced unpaid tax requests ranging from £ 80,000 – more than it would earn in one year – £ 20,000 while a payment plan established in 2018 was canceled at random.
It took many years to achieve a new regulation and after £ 18,000, it was finally agreed, it was struck by an interest invoice of £ 10,000 for the delay in payment.
Stephen Bishop says that the stress of HMRC driving had an impact on his wedding
The HMRC continued to contact him after asking to go through his accountant because of his deterioration in mental health, an inspector even presenting himself at his door.
“I can honestly understand why so many people have followed their lives on this subject. The impact has been devastating about me,” he said.
What is examined?
Since 2016, the HMRC has agreed with 25,000 regulations with employers and individuals concerning their use of loan schemes, which will increase around 4.2 billion pounds of income.
However, more than 40,000 people and 5,000 employers have no regulations yet.
The Labor Party promised an “independent exam” in the opposition, the Minister of the Treasury James Murray saying that the accusation of loan had “become a nightmare for ordinary people … who are the victims of the erroneous sale and faced a financial ruin”.
The loan accusation left many people faced with a financial ruin
After winning the elections, Mr. Murray also attended a “heartbreaking meeting” where many victims of loan charges “founded in tears”, according to Greg Smith, conservative co -president of the loan accusation and the equity of taxpayers, a multi -party parliamentary group (APPG), which suggested that “partial exam” was declining the “voluntary financial breakdown” and more reduced suicides if people continue.
The activists hoped that the investigation would examine the principle of retrospective tax legislation, the role of promoters who have made profits from the regimes and the conduct of the HMRC.
However, it will only examine the obstacles to which obstacles are faced with those who have not yet settled and recommend means to do so by summer. And it is managed by the former boss of HMRC, Ray McCann, leading to some to question his independence.
‘Internal stitch-up’
Sir Iain Duncan Smith, a former conservative leader and another long-term criticism of the loan accusation, described the review of “internal sewing point of the HMRC … managed by an ex-honorcho-hmrc”.
He said the loan accusation is a “disaster” made by the tax office for having been slow to sequence the loan regimes and that the government should “trace a line under this and raft the debt”.
Sir Iain Duncan Smith
“It seems to me that any deputy who becomes Minister of the Treasury is prisoner by them. This should be a large -scale examination where the distribution of the blame is part of it,” added Duncan Smith.
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In a letter responding to the concerns of the APPG, Mr. Murray said he would have been “irresponsible for the government not to recognize the difficult tax circumstances which we have inherited” and “this is the context in which this review takes place”.
He also defended the independence of Mr. McCann, saying that the former president of the Charter Institute for Taxation is “a highly respected figure in the fiscal world whose name was suggested by one of the activists of loan charges”.
The government has refused to comment more while the exam is underway.
Anyone feeling emotionally in distress or suicidal can call the Samaritans to obtain help at 116 123 or by e-mail jo@samaritans.org in the United Kingdom. In the United States, call the Samaritan branch in your region or 1 (800) 273-Talk