HMRC to target evasion of tax on overseas property

Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs (HMRC) will target wealthy people who own property abroad, the department announced today.

The Revenue's 200-strong specialist "affluent" team will focus on people who do not appear to be able to legitimately afford their foreign properties, or who do not declare the income and gains on their properties.

The team is also focusing on commodity traders and people with offshore accounts, HMRC said.

David Gauke, exchequer secretary to the Treasury, said: "The government is committed to tackling tax evasion and avoidance across all areas of the economy.

"That is why we allocated HMRC £917m to reduce the tax gap over the next four years in the last spending review. This new team is part of that investment."

In October, HMRC announced it would investigate 6,000 accounts belonging to possible UK residents but held in Switzerland by HSBC, which it suspected were being used to evade tax.