Antiavoidance rules

There has been a lot in the press recently about the difference between evasion and avoidance.

Now that MPs expense claims have been made public, there is a lot of concern about them breaking the rules.

There is of course a big difference between breaking the rules and claiming for something you are not entitled to (which we might call evasion) and following the rules and claiming for something which the rules did not really mean you to have but that you are entitled to (which we might call avoidance).

So are we going to see a new set of rules which will be much tighter or rules drawn up in a different way which will rely on principles more than details?

Hang on - isn't that what the prime minister and chancellor have been saying about tax? They want to claw back all the tax that has been avoided by claiming what was allowed by the rules.

Sadly the government finances are not going to be sorted out by MPs repaying expenses that in retrospect they should not have claimed.

But if MPs were only obeying the rules which they had themselves written about their own expense - can they blame the rest of us for obeying the tax rules and claiming everything we are entitled to under the rules? Can they demand a higher standard than they exhibit themselves?

Will the government begin to see things from the other side of the fence (the side so many MPs appear to be on when claiming expenses) and change the language they use? Perhaps "unacceptable tax avoidance" will become "bringing the country's tax system into disrepute" and the tax system updated with this in mind.