Taking the blame

The reason why departing HMRC chief lin Homer got a damehood when her career has been full of expensive errors ( letters) is because when politicians make mistakes, they need someone to take the blame — step forward ms Homer.

An insider at HMRC told me that some years ago senior management were ordered to make drastic cuts in running expenses. they got rid of senior tax officers and replaced them with untested computer systems. Departing staff warned of chaos, which is what happened.

chancellor george osborne issued a supportive statement of lin Homer, saying that ‘she made a real contribution to public service modernisation’. so, that’s OK then. PETER SIMPSON,

Dudley, W. Mids. IN HER letter headed Hot Denials on January 15, Terri Jackson referred to data from ‘RSS’. We expanded the initials to The Royal Statistical Society. The intended reference was to Remote Sensing Systems. We are sorry for any confusion caused.