Just when ContractorUK readers probably thought the McCann Loan Charge Review couldn’t get any less credible, new information revealed by Freedom of Information (FoI) responses has blown out of the water any lasting pretence that this was an independent review — as senior Labour figures promised.
The new and damning disclosures show that, despite presenting Ray McCann, a former HMRC Assistant Director, as completely independent, Treasury ministers and officials were privately having detailed discussions about not one but three conflicts of interest that their appointment of him posed.
In a section of the FoI material (obtained by LCAG) headed “Candidate Due Diligence,” in the No 10 Direct Appointments Pro Forma, it states that the Treasury identified the three key sources of potential perceived conflicts, notably:
- McCann’s previous work for HMRC
- McCann’s public comments on the policy area of the loan charge
- McCann’s public support for Labour /the governing party.
Here, exclusively for ContractorUK, I will unpack these three — but a warning, it gets worse, writes Greg Smith MP, co-chair of the Loan Charge and Taxpayer Fairness APPG.
In an attempt to sweep these conflicts and concerns under the carpet, the Treasury quietly ruled out the supposedly independent review of the Loan Charge from looking at HMRC’s historical role in tackling disguised remuneration prior to the introduction of the Loan Charge.
These three conflicts of interest, plus this knee-jerk curtailing of the McCann Review terms, beggar belief, and I reveal all of this scandalous behaviour below.
Did Labour actually promise an independent loan charge review?
There were high hopes when, in 2024, a trio of soon-to-be Treasury ministers, Rachel Reeves, Darren Jones and James Murray, committed to holding a “truly independent” review of the Loan Charge scandal, to use their own words.
Yet, with its report having been published in November 2025, the credibility of the officially titled "Independent Loan Charge Review" is unravelling, almost as fast as Keir Starmer’s Government, because of these FoI disclosures and the three conflicts of interest at their heart.
Like so many broken promises and U-turns since the July 2024 General Election, the clear commitment to hold a genuinely independent review into what these then-incoming Treasury ministers agreed was a scandal was watered down, to be merely a review of settlement terms, not a review of the Loan Charge itself, never mind a proper investigation into the whole multifaceted scandal.
That’s the additional injustice I’ll come to, which the Treasury came up with to try to ease at least one of the three conflicts of interest that they knew about, in appointing former taxman Ray McCann to lead their supposedly ‘independent’ review of the Loan Charge.
When was an independent loan charge review first called for?
When I was elected to Parliament in December 2019, there were a number of issues already on my political radar, because groups of affected constituents had contacted me.
One of these issues was the Loan Charge, the deeply controversial law that retrospectively allowed HMRC to rip up the normal rule book and issue tax demands without having to go through the inconvenience of proving their case legally.
I had been contacted by many constituents who were facing ruin as a result of this law, which by then had already tragically pushed several people to suicide. I pledged to do what I could to challenge this clear injustice, and in May 2021, I was elected by colleagues as a Co-Chair of the Loan Charge and Taxpayer Fairness APPG.
Was there a loan charge review before Ray McCann’s?
There had been a previous supposedly independent review —the Morse Review.
But it soon became apparent that the Morse Review was not really independent at all.
The Morse Review was staffed by HMRC and Treasury officials (the two government bodies supposedly being reviewed).
And it had clear collaboration with other officials, leading to the famous “we owe you beers” line from the Treasury press office, thanking the review secretariat for their efforts!
When was the Morse Review discredited?
In June 2020, the Loan Charge and Taxpayer Fairness APPG published a damning report on the profound lack of independence of the Morse Review.
Since then (and despite my being a Conservative MP under a Conservative Government), we used our collective voice to push hard for a fresh, and this time fully comprehensive, genuinely independent review.
What has Rachel Reeves said about the loan charge?
We hoped that we had succeeded in this push for an independent loan charge review, when Rachel Reeves, then-shadow chancellor, told the writer and radio presenter Iain Dale that she and a future Labour government would 'do' an independent review.
Rachel Reeves, now of course Chancellor (if not for much longer as of early July 2026), told Iain’s LBC programme, referring to the discredited Morse Review:
“The [Conservative] Government did a review, but it’s clearly not good enough and the way that people are being treated is not acceptable…who are the real culprits here. It’s the people who mis-sold products, and people like you are the innocent victims in this sort of war of attrition with HMRC now”.
LBC presenter Iain Dale asked Ms Reeves:
“Would you give a commitment to have an independent inquiry? Because the government’s one, the Morse Review, is effectively the government marking its own homework. A bit like the Post Office did.”
Rachel Reeves replied: “Yeah we will, we will do that.”
LBC’s Mr Dale pressed: “An independent review?” and Rachel replied, “Yep, we will do that review”.
However, the new information revealed to the Loan Charge Action Group, which prised it out of The Treasury using Freedom of Information (FoI) rules, has destroyed any lasting pretence that McCann’s review was independent.
How do the three conflicts of interest shatter the McCann Review’s ‘independence’?
The FoI disclosures reveal that although they actively presented Ray McCann as completely independent, Treasury ministers and officials were privately emailing each other about the three conflicts of interest concerning the former HMRC director’s appointment.
To recap, the three conflicts of interest flagged up in the released emails are McCann’s:
- previous work for HMRC
- his public comments on the loan charge, and
- his public support for Labour.
Conflict One: McCann’s previous work for HMRC
The briefing note (on page 4) lays out Mr McCann’s HMRC history as follows, noting not only that he has worked for the tax authority for a very long time — but also that he worked in the same department and area of work as that related to the Loan Charge:
“Mr. McCann worked for the Inland Revenue/HMRC for 31 years. During his time with HMRC, he worked as an Inspector of Taxes in various compliance roles and was latterly a Deputy Director in HMRC’s Anti-Avoidance Group (AAG) (the predecessor to the current Counter Avoidance directorate). During his time in AAG, Mr. McCann was directly involved in HMRC’s activity to counter the use of disguised remuneration schemes.”
A briefing note to Ministers, on page 7 of the FoI release, shows officials advising ministers:
“You should note the risk that this creates a perceived conflict of interest, particularly if the scope of the review requires a reviewer to consider HMRC’s historical role in tackling disguised remuneration prior to the introduction of the Loan Charge.”
Indeed, how can a supposedly independent reviewer of HMRC’s loan charge have worked for HMRC for 31 years and, in the very same area of HMRC work as the loan charge?
How did HM Treasury respond to this clear conflict of interest?
The Treasury’s neat way around the stated concern – “particularly if the scope of the review requires a reviewer to consider HMRC’s historical role in tackling disguised remuneration prior to the introduction of the Loan Charge” — was simply to exclude this from the review. It really is quite extraordinary.
In other words, the Treasury realised that former HMRC Assistant Director Ray McCann’s conflict of interest couldn’t possibly be ignored if the review considered HMRC’s role in the whole scandal, so they just decided to restrict the review to exclude it. Any genuine review would be properly investigating and holding to account the very Government agency responsible for the Loan Charge scandal and looking into HMRC’s role, conduct and failures. Excluding this shows not only that the review was demonstrably not independent, but also shows it wasn’t at all a proper review of the Loan Charge scandal either.
Conflict two: McCann’s past public comments on the loan charge
The second conflict of interest identified by Treasury officials about Ray McCann’s appointment is his long history of commenting on the Loan Charge scandal.
This extensive history includes McCann’s comment made to the Treasury Select Committee, where he expressed a lack of sympathy for those caught up in the Laon Charge, even though people were victims of mis-selling, and despite the known devastating impact on many individuals caught up in this nightmare.
McCann told the committee back in 2018:
“It is quite a challenge for someone who has any knowledge and experience of these arrangements [loan schemes] to look at this with great sympathy.”
When you consider that his “knowledge and experience” comes directly from working for HMRC, in the same area as the Loan Charge, this single statement should — and would have ruled him out, had this ever been an independent review.
Conflict three: McCann’s public support for the political party behind the review
The emails released to LCAG show the Treasury was aware of Mr McCann’s clear political bias too, as someone who has clearly been far from impartial when it comes to party politics. He’d actually expressed support for the Labour government on more than one occasion.
They state: “Mr McCann has criticised the Conservative Party on social media, both when they were in government and since they have been in opposition. He has also supported the current government on certain issues, including measures recently announced at Budget”.
This third clear conflict of interest about ex-HMRC’s Ray McCann’s appointment to ‘independent’ review the HMRC loan charge exposes what had started to become more and more obvious. And that is that, as well as being someone who agreed to conduct a limited review, on the government’s terms, thereby avoiding reviewing both HMRC’s historical failures and the Loan Charge itself, we now know that this was a political appointment of someone friendly to the very administration that commissioned the review!
Did Loan Charge government officials ignore basic parameters of independence?
The Loan Charge and Taxpayer Fairness APPG has not only called consistently for an independent review, but actually laid out in detail, what a proper review would look like and the way it had to be set up, to ensure independence.
We sent this letter to Rachel Reeves in December 2024, once she was Chancellor of the Exchequer. This letter reached Ms Reeves before the promised review was announced.
The APPG’s letter clearly lays out the basic criteria of what ‘independent’ would mean, including that it had to be someone with no links to HMRC.
We urged the new government not to repeat the farce of the Morse Review, which had been so comprehensively shown to be far from independent. We actually stated in the letter:
“Another partial and biased review will do nothing to resolve the whole mess, for the tens of thousands of families affected or for the Government, that rightly wants to seek a resolution. The fresh review/inquiry must be set up properly and then conducted with full transparency and access to all witnesses…This time, it must be properly independent, with HMRC and Treasury staff having no role and no involvement, other than to give evidence, which they must do on the record.”
All of this was, alas, ignored, along with the rest of the letter.
Instead, Labour’s Treasury ministers did exactly the same thing as Conservative Treasury ministers.
And that was to make a convenient appointment of a former HMRC Assistant Director to conduct a review that was indeed “partial and biased”, merely of settlement terms, ignoring HMRC’s historic role and starting from the premise that the Loan Charge was justified and that those affected were liable for the tax, despite this never having been directly legally proven.
[Editor’s Note: The Treasury emails released under the FoI rules describe the internal conversation that was had about the Morse Review of the loan charge, and criticism that it wasn’t fully independent, as being “brief”].
Did Ray McCann pass even basic tests of independence?
According to the emails, it appears fully understood by officials and ministers that Ray McCann did not meet even the basic tests to be regarded as independent.
On page 4 of the briefing note, Treasury officials state that this was clearly understood – but completely ignored :
“In their letter to the Prime Minister (in his then position of Leader of the Opposition) during the General Election period, the Loan Charge Action Group (LCAG) set out their asks for a ‘genuinely independent review’. These included that ‘The reviewer/head of the inquiry must not be appointed by Government (Treasury and HMRC) and they must have no input into candidates or candidate selection. The APPG has previously suggested a tax judge, but whoever it is, it must be someone with no links to HMRC or Government, past or present.”
They also go on to acknowledge that the Loan Charge Action Group (LCAG) had made the very simple and obvious suggestion that the reviewer must be:
“someone with no links to HMRC or Government, past or present”.
This, of course, should have been the very starting point in looking for an independent reviewer to look at the profound failure of public administration on the part of HMRC and the Treasury.
Yet this was completely ignored, even though Treasury officials advised the ministers:
“So, you should note that Mr. McCann does not meet LCAG’s stated criteria for a suitable reviewer.”
These latest revelations shatter any pretence that the Labour Government has conducted the ‘genuinely independent’ review that Ministers promised. We now know that the Treasury privately acknowledged serious concerns about Ray McCann’s lack of independence, yet appointed him anyway, then publicly presented this as an independent review.
Why did Ray McCann’s HMRC employment history get edited out?
Another attempted sleight of hand about the McCann Review is that Treasury ministers and officials took the decision to deliberately omit Mr McCann’s history of working for HMRC and its predecessor, the Inland Revenue from public-facing government documents, which is simply dishonest.
Instead, he has been referred to as a “Past President of the CIOT” (the Chartered Institute of Taxation). This is a one-year positionand a voluntary role.
For Treasury officials to continue to cite this and omit Mr McCann’s 31 years working for the very body that conceived of and introduced the Loan Charge is scandalous.
Has there been a breach of the Civil Service Code principles?
A deliberately misleading description of the loan charge reviewer must surely be a breach of the principles of the Civil Service Code. One of the core principles of the Code, which all civil servants must follow, is “Honesty.” The Code states that civil servants must “set out the facts and relevant issues truthfully” and must not “deceive or knowingly mislead ministers”.
Deliberately omitting Ray McCann’s 31 years working for the very body that conceived of and implemented the Loan Charge — see that omission here for example — is not “setting out the facts truthfully”.
There should be an investigation into who proposed this cynical attempt to present Mr McCann in a way that clearly sought to ignore his links with HMRC. This is now the latest part of the whole Loan Charge scandal – and something that a proper independent inquiry into the HMRC policy must investigate and ensure those responsible are held to account.
This all links to the loss of trust in Keir Starmer’s Government
One of the key reasons that the Keir Starmer-led government, with Rachel Reeves as its chancellor, has imploded, after just two years, is that it has lost the trust of the British people.
Many people who voted for Labour in 2024 feel betrayed by the broken promises, the U-turns, and the lack of hope, especially because Sir Keir Starmer promised “Change.”
How has Labour broken its promise on the Loan Charge?
The Loan Charge scandal is one more clear example of a broken promise.
It’s a clear broken promise as well, when you consider the previous wording of the commitments made by the very ministers in charge of the Treasury when commissioning the McCann Review.
It was the then exchequer secretary James Murray, currently the health secretary, who clearly stated that he would commit to a “truly independent review”. The same position was taken by Darren Jones, currently in the cabinet as chief secretary to the prime minister, but Jones was chief secretary to the Treasury when Ray McCann was appointed.
Mr Jones told the House of Commons: “Will the Treasury use this moment today to finally agree to commission a further truly independent review”?
Yet in the private documents, which ministers and officials thought would never see the light of day, it has now been revealed that, privately, they were all well aware that there were serious issues regarding Ray McCann’s independence — mainly three conflicts of interest — and that a review by him would never be credibly regarded as a “truly independent” review or assessment.
My view is that appointing someone who worked for HMRC for 31 years in the same area of work as the Loan Charge to do a review of the Loan Charge, is just like appointing a former senior Post Office executive to conduct a review of the Post Office Scandal.
The central injustice of the Loan Charge remains
What is most depressing about the McCann Review is that, despite making some positive recommendations, which we welcome, the central injustice at the heart of the Loan Charge scandal remains.
And that injustice is that HMRC is only pursuing those who used schemes following professional advice, not the perpetrators of that mis-selling. Mis-selling happened on an industrial scale, often aided and abetted by chartered accountants, accredited tax advisers and even blue chip recruitment agencies — all of whom were involved in promoting the schemes.
As Rachel Reeves told Iain Dale, “HMRC seem to be coming after the people who were mis-sold these products rather than the people who were mis-selling them, and that is a real scandal”.
Yet the McCann Loan Charge Review recommendations leave in place the same approach (albeit with some reductions), but with HMRC only pursuing the victims of mis-selling, while not seeking to recover a penny from those who mis-sold the arrangements and made millions doing so.
Why did Labour choose Ray McCann to lead the ‘independent’ loan charge review?
It is now abundantly clear that Labour opted for a convenient appointment of a former senior HMRC official, who has expressed support for Labour, to conduct a review that was deliberately devised not to properly investigate HMRC’s historic role or the wider policy.
These latest revelations, showing three clear conflicts of interest, a curtailing of the loan charge review’s scope to try to ignore HMRC’s historic failures and a cynical attempt to redact of Ray McCann’s HMRC history, are the latest shoddy chapter of the Loan Charge Scandal.
Treasury ministers continue to insult people’s basic intelligence by describing Ray McCann’s limited exercise as an independent review, and a review conducted by someone who worked in a senior role for HMRC — the very public body largely responsible for the Loan Charge scandal.
To continue to parrot the line that this was an ‘Independent Loan Charge Review’ is so palpably absurd that it demeans the ministers, civil servants and any others who parrot it.
As the co-chair of the Loan Charge and Taxpayer Fairness APPG, I believe it’s now time for the Treasury’s ministers to stop pretending that they delivered an independent review, or a review of the Loan Charge scandal, or even a review of the Loan Charge legislation.
The more they do so, the more absurd they will look.
What is the Loan Charge and Taxpayer Fairness APPG hoping for?
At the time of writing, we will have a new chancellor of the exchequer in a couple of months and, hopefully, a clear-out of both those who broke their promises to hold an independent review and those who continue to try to present the McCann Review as such.
We at the Loan Charge and Taxpayer Fairness APPG will keep on calling for what is clearly needed, and that’s the only thing that can finally hold HMRC and the Treasury — under successive governments — to account; a proper, thoroughly independent inquiry of the whole loan charge scandal.
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