As with what's emerging about Horizon, accountants can already see the problems and are aghast. See Richard Murphy's blog post:
https://www.accountingweb.co.uk/tax/hmrc-policy/government-seeks-to-view-claimants-bank-accounts#:~:text=Data%20collection%20could%20start%20from,thinks%20this%20an%20easy%20exercise.
There was almost no Parliamentary time allocated to discuss any of that proposed legislation, but included in it, starting at page 98, was a provision that impacts every practicing accountant and many of their clients quite significantly.
On that page a new clause 121DB was added to the Social Security Administration Act 1992, saying: “Schedule 3B makes provision about a power for the Secretary of State to obtain account information.”
If passed (and that is not certain, as the Lords are likely to have a great deal to say about this, if given the chance) the new Schedule 3B empowers the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, who administers social security, to compel banks to provide any data that the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) demands so that it might search for fraud and error on the part of benefit claimants.
Crucially, this is not an investigative power taken so that fraud might be pursued when there is reasonable belief and prior evidence that it might be taking place. Instead, this is a general power, permitting the DWP, which now administers benefit payments, to request that banks that receive such payments provide information on the bank accounts of all benefit recipients on a regular and recurring basis.
State pensioners included
It was suggested at first that the power would be used to demand information on the bank accounts of universal credit, pension credit and employment and support allowance claimants. That is approximately 8.8m people. But then Stephen Timms, a veteran Labour MP, realised that the power extended to everyone in receipt of a state pension as well, and raised the issue in the Commons.
That extends the right to collect data to another 11m or so people (having allowed for those already claiming pension credit). Other benefits are also covered. Child benefit, widely claimed by the clients of many accountants, could be on that list.
Extraordinarily, most of these covered by the new provision will be in receipt of benefits that are not earnings-related when it comes to determining entitlement. Given that many disability benefits also seem to be covered, many are also not linked to savings. Well over 10m people will have their bank account details sent to the government under this legislation on a regular basis, even though the data supplied cannot in any way impact their entitlement to the benefit that they are paid.