To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, how much taxpayers’ money each trade union has (a) registered with the Certification Officer and (b) claimed under the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme, according to information held by HM Revenue and Customs.
Answered on
10 September 2020
Trade unions do not register taxpayer’s money with the Certification Officer. Section 32 of the Trade Union and Labour Relations (Consolidation) Act 1992 requires trade unions to provide an annual return to the Certification Officer detailing their income and expenditure for a given period. Trade unions are not required to include specific details of payments received from Government departments, agencies or arms-length bodies in this annual return.
The Government is not able to publish information about employers who have used the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme (CJRS) and who are also trade unions. This is in relation to HMRC’s duty of confidentiality. HMRC cannot publish identifying information that relates to one of its functions. The CJRS is one of HMRC’s functions and publishing a list of organisations would provide identifying information.