HM REVENUE AND CUSTOMS CONTACT CENTRE TRIAL OF PRIVATE CONTRACTORS

That this House congratulates staff working in HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) contact centres on increasing the positive answering rate to 71 per cent. of calls to date in 2011-12; notes the correlation between this contact rate and HMRC's decision to recruit over 1,000 extra call centre staff in the last year, albeit with over 80 per cent. on temporary contracts; acknowledges that staff representatives have proposed flexible staff transfer arrangements to respond to the substantial fluctuations in call numbers to HMRC contact centres; is deeply concerned by HMRC's award of two contracts to private sector suppliers, Sitel and Teleperformance, to conduct 12 month trials of their telephony advice services, based in HMRC's contact centres at Bathgate, Scotland and Lilyhall, Cumbria threatening the 1,300 permanent HMRC jobs in those locations; further notes that HMRC contact centres were targeted in the Government's Comprehensive Spending Review for 18 per cent. staff cuts in 2010-11; shares the Public and Commercial Services Union's opposition to any further privatisation of HMRC work; and calls on the Government to retain some of the planned 10,000 HMRC job cuts over the next three years so they can be re-deployed in HMRC contact centres in line with demand and to end the tendering for private telephony advice services in HMRC contact centres.