HM Revenue & Customs as a co-operative? A radically stupid idea from the Conservatives...

A Conservative government will establish a Public Sector Co-op Service, which will have a full-time staff with the resources and expertise needed to provide guidance to every public sector body about becoming a co-op.

This is a direct quote from 'An Invitation to Public Sector Workers', the Conservative Public Sector manifesto, which they published on Saturday. No, really, I kid you not.

I find myself wondering if this has been terribly well thought through. You see, as a junior tax official, I work for an organisation that raises money, albeit not that much these days, but nevertheless, you get my drift.

Co-operatives will be contracted by government to deliver services, and as long as they meet agreed national standards, they will be completely free from government control. They can decide on management structures, service delivery, and can reinvest any financial surpluses they make as a result of making improvements and efficiencies into the service or share them with staff;

Hmmm... does this mean that if my team raises more money than it is targeted to, we can share the excess as a staff bonus? Or does it simply means that if we cut costs, the balance of our assigned running costs for the years can be distributed, thus wiping out your efficiency savings.

Now I am particularly keen on the former. After all, it would offer me a genuine incentive to carry out more compliance work, launch more investigations, ask more questions, all in the hope of unearthing tax evasion, increasing our profit and thus increasing my income. Of course, this would add to the compliance burden on small and medium sized enterprises, but why would I care under such circumstances?

And all the evidence is that there is an enormous tax gap that might be filled by a newly enthused HMRC. How popular would any government be with the business sector if there was a rather more active campaign to raise revenue and scrutinise books and records? 

Of course, it is possible that they don't intend us to be included, in which case they've mislead 70,000 voters, but given that David Cameron has told the Chinese Government that we need Trident to point it at them, how could offending a few tens of thousands of civil servants between friends do any more harm?