Again, I thank Opposition colleagues. Let me pick up a couple of the points raised. The hon. Member for Glasgow Central asks for safeguards, and of course she makes a very important wider point. In a rule of law society we want as little discretion as possible to be exercised—and, in particular, personal discretion—so it is important that within HMRC there is baked in a culture of accountability for decisions. From that point of view, nothing is changing. This measure is ratifying an existing set of arrangements by putting them on a legal basis. However, I can reassure her that the issue of safeguards and the balance of powers between HMRC and taxpayers is taken very seriously, and I have specifically commissioned work within HMRC to ensure that that balance is appropriately maintained, not just at customer level but more generally.

The hon. Lady and the hon. Member for Ilford North raised the question of decision making more generally. I think I have, in a way, spoken to that, but I recognise that there is a distinction between the automated exercise of a decision and the capacity to make a decision itself. Of course, HMRC does increasingly rely on computerised systems, and it is absolutely right for our purposes as a nation that it should do so. It is, for example, inconceivable that we could have responded to coronavirus with either the self-employed scheme or the furlough scheme without heavy reliance on computing. It is to HMRC’s enormous credit that it was able to commission and bring into effect a platform and an approach to those schemes in a matter of weeks, using that computing expertise. I also agree with the hon. Gentleman when he points out that there are benefits not merely in terms of customer service, but in freeing up people and, we hope, improving the quality of work by taking HMRC staff away from the more routine operations and more towards higher quality work that can give more professional satisfaction.