Contractor challenges Stringer over claim that risk-takers are unaffected

How can Mr Stringer defend the statement that, "Those businesses which invest, take risks and create employment, will not be affected."

I have invested large sums in my training, in equipment to have my own test-bed of Unix systems and for tools which are not provided for me on customers' sites. I take risks in having no work at the end of contracts, in being ill or suffering an accident and thereby being unable to fulfil my obligations. In those circumstances my business has no income so I have no salary. I have no safety net of unemployment benefit, sickness benefit or paid leave other than is provided by my own company.

As far as creating employment there is no scope for creating further employment under the IR35 legislation.

The real myth is that people working as I do are on the same footing as employees. We are clearly not the same as employees; we are the same as businesses and should be treated as such.

Mr Stringer's colleagues are already aware of a shortage of people in the highly skilled areas of IT. As more people like myself leave the country to more sympathetic regimes the market forces will see rates rise to counteract the extra taxation which those remaining may be forced to pay.

Companies do not want people like me as full time employees, they want us to help them over immediate problems in areas that their staff are short of skills. A lot has been said about the ulterior motives of this legislation. I do not believe that people will return to employee status in response to this legislation. People will either leave or rates will rise making the growth of ecommerce and computing all the slower.

All the rhetoric about UK plc being in the forefront of IT in the world will not be worth anything without people with the skills to carry it out and companies being able to afford sufficient skilled people to bring it about. The government prides itself on joined-up policies but fails to see that damaging small companies with people with these skills is damaging the industry it would like to see prosper.