IPSE referral

[jamesbrown]

What ms said...

I totally agree. It's very hard to demonstrate a negative, but stopping bad things happening is most of what IPSE gets up to when dealing with HMG. And let's face it, nobody else is even trying.

Also worth remembering that all three major threats to us - IR35 itself, the 2020 changes and the Loan Charge debacle - are all down to the idiot Hammond who even May has recognised as being a total failure. And he wasn't listening to anyone.

This has nothing to do with Hammond or Osborne or any other ex-Chancellor. Do you think people like Hammond and Osborne spend their time pondering IR35 trajectory? Advisers advise and ministers decide, but ministers mostly just take the strong advice they are given on difficult, technical policies ("don't worry, Chancellor, we've got this").

The reason to deprecate IPSE's lobbying is not because IPSE is especially incompetent at forming a narrative (although, we are talking about an organisation who thought the Freelancer Limited Company was a good idea), but because they oversell lobbying as an effective tool. Lobbying on tax policy has never been very effective. They will nod nicely and make pleasant sounds, but they are ignoring IPSE on anything important. The reality is that, when you're de facto outside the tent, it is often better to piss over the tent and everything in it.

Bottom line, if you cannot see the benefits of IPSE's lobbying, and the narrative looks a bit crap, then you should focus on the concrete things that IPSE does provide (many of which are good), and consider the rest as being overhead that makes IPSE less competitive against other suppliers.