The new chair of the treasury select committee has been blocking people on Twitter who mention the controversial loan charge policy that he drove through as a government minister — regardless, they say, of whether or not they tweeted at him.

Among those blocked by Mel Stride on Twitter is the brother of a man who killed himself after being hit with the loan charge.

Stride, former financial secretary to the Treasury, has also blocked Greg Wright, the deputy business editor of the Yorkshire Post, who has been investigating the policy.

And he has blocked multiple campaigners, including Iain Campbell, the secretary general of the Independent Health Professionals Association, which represents locum doctors and NHS agency workers.

The loan charge, which has been linked to seven suicides as well as bankruptcies and marriage breakdowns, has left more than 50,000 people facing huge tax demands on income dating back 20 years.

The government says the contractors affected — including IT workers, engineers, nurses, and social workers — used "disguised remuneration schemes" to avoid taxes; many workers were assured by accountants at the time that this was legal, and some were even told they had to use the schemes to keep their jobs.

More than 200 MPs are calling for the loan charge to be suspended. An independent review was ordered by prime minister Boris Johnson and is due to report next month.



Stride blocked one man whose brother — an engineer in his mid-forties who had two children — killed himself in September. He is anonymous on Twitter but spoke to BuzzFeed News about his brother earlier this month.