Senior tax partner at law firm Allen & Overy Patrick Mears has today been named the new chairman of the GAAR advisory panel by HMRC, following a lengthy recruitment process.

Mears, who has 30 years of UK and international tax experience, will take over from outgoing interim chair, Graham Aaronson QC, on April 15, and lead the work to recruit permanent members of the advisory panel .

The interim members of the advisory panel will continue in their appointments until 15 April in order to allow more time for them to approve the HMRC GAAR guidance. All existing members are free to be considered, but have no priority over others.

Aaronson's replacement was originally due to be announced in January but was subsequently put back.

The current interim GAAR panel members include John Barnett, partner and joint head of corporate tax, Burges Salmon; John Bartlett, head of group tax, BP and member of CBI tax committee; Emma Chamberlain, barrister, Pump Court Tax Chambers; Robert Clayton. group tax director, RSA Insurance Group; Bill Dodwell, head of tax policy, Deloitte LLP; Steve Edge, corporate tax partner, Slaughter and May; Francesca Lagerberg, head of tax, Grant Thornton; Dr David McNair, principal economic justice adviser, Christian Aid; Richard Murphy, head, Tax Research UK; Gary Richards, senior corporate tax partner at Berwin Leighton Paisner; and Tim Voak, group tax director, Tesco and member of the CBI tax committee.

HMRC will provide admin and secretariat support to the panel, but will not be part of considering the cases themselves.