Tax Avoidance

[Hereiam]

We all knew it was happening and i have to be honest its one list i would love to be on

[Minder]

The most staggering aspect is those fckers on Mrs Browns Boys get paid so much

[brokencrossbar1]

There is actually a way that small companies can do this, the same as all the larger scale companies but the loopholes are being closed.

[Hereiam]

The government is bringing in universal credit and cutting DLA to claw back money but yet nothing will be done about this.

[TabClear]

Assuming that these companies did everything legally people need to wind their necks in.  There was some professor on the radio earlier moaning about lack of morals etc from these companies. What a crock of shit.

If the government thinks there are loopholes then pay the money to get proper advice and draft the legislation properly, don't expect private companies to decide where you meant to draw the line.

[Eamonnca1]

Assuming that these companies did everything legally people need to wind their necks in.  There was some professor on the radio earlier moaning about lack of morals etc from these companies. What a crock of shit.

If the government thinks there are loopholes then pay the money to get proper advice and draft the legislation properly, don't expect private companies to decide where you meant to draw the line.

Couldn't agree more. It's not the job of companies to close tax loopholes, that's the job of legislators.

[screenexile]

Assuming that these companies did everything legally people need to wind their necks in.  There was some professor on the radio earlier moaning about lack of morals etc from these companies. What a crock of shit.

If the government thinks there are loopholes then pay the money to get proper advice and draft the legislation properly, don't expect private companies to decide where you meant to draw the line.

Could agree more. It's not the job of companies to close tax loopholes, that's the job of legislators.

The polarisation of politics means that's unlikely as we now get fuckwits coming out with sound bites elected to positions rather than people who can do the job... what would experts know anyway!!

[seafoid]

The government is bringing in universal credit and cutting DLA to claw back money but yet nothing will be done about this.

Tax avoidance breeds austerity. UK tax receipts are about 5% of GDP lower than spending

[Sandino]

Amazed at the coverage being give to Mrs Brown's boys. Two million among three people over 16 months is not that cazy but they should have still paid their taxes! Not much chat about the Saxe Coburg's though, I do hope they are not just trying to deflect the news from them.

[haranguerer]

The headline on the BBC had been about the Queens avoidance, it was swiftly changed to probably the least inoffensive on the list.

[magpie seanie]

Next time you hear some idiot giving out about benefits remind them that if tax avoidance were ended we could pay those benefits multiple times over and still have plenty of extra money.

[TheOptimist]

Assuming that these companies did everything legally people need to wind their necks in.  There was some professor on the radio earlier moaning about lack of morals etc from these companies. What a crock of shit.

If the government thinks there are loopholes then pay the money to get proper advice and draft the legislation properly, don't expect private companies to decide where you meant to draw the line.

Couldn't agree more. It's not the job of companies to close tax loopholes, that's the job of legislators.

Yes... but in the case of the Isle of Man, the regulator was drafting the law based on the request of Appleby, who had requested it to specifically allow their clients to avoid tax. The regulator was even running the wording past Appleby before bringing the law before government. Companies should be held morally accountable as they do have influence on governments, and the whole system is entangled between governments and the rich. As the cliche says all to make the rich richer and the poor poorer.

[TheOptimist]

Amazed at the coverage being give to Mrs Brown's boys. Two million among three people over 16 months is not that cazy but they should have still paid their taxes! Not much chat about the Saxe Coburg's though, I do hope they are not just trying to deflect the news from them.

Was thinking the same. I wonder did Brendan O'Carroll telling them to F*** off have any influence on this?

[AQMP]

Don't necessarily agree with all this but some interesting points:

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/nov/07/tax-bono-harming-world-poorest-glastonbury-avoidance-paradise-papers

Tax rogues like Bono are harming the world's poorest people

In 2011 I organised a protest at U2's headline gig at Glastonbury. As Bono sang The Fly, a 9ft wide, 24ft high balloon was inflated at the front of the audience bearing the words U PAY TAX 2?. The protest was prompted by U2's decision in 2006 to move their tax affairs from Ireland to the Netherlands, after the Irish government decided to cap the tax-free exemption on royalties at €225,000 (before this, artists in Ireland were not obliged to pay any tax on royalties). The aim of the action was to highlight the impact of transnational tax dodging on the developing world. In a chilling report, Christian Aid estimated that $160bn is lost to the developing world each year as profits made in poorer countries are shifted to wealthier tax havens.

A few days before the protest, the co-founder of Bono's charity One, Jamie Drummond, telephoned me to try to persuade me to call off the action, citing worries that we might undermine Bono's campaigning efforts. We had a long conversation in which I eventually suggested that, regardless of what we do, Bono's tax affairs will inevitably cast a shadow over his campaigning. At this point Drummond became slightly aggressive, and insisted that it was our actions alone that were doing damage.

With the recent Paradise Papers revelations concerning Bono's finances, it looks like my prediction has come to pass. Bono chose to invest in a company based in ultra-low tax Malta, which incorporated a Lithuanian company – in order to buy a shopping centre – which has paid no tax in Lithuania despite having made profits. The company was later transferred to zero-tax (on company profits) Guernsey. To be fair to Bono, he is not creating artificial structures in order to avoid paying tax on his income (the kind of practice adopted by some of the stars of Mrs Brown's Boys). However, by making this investment, he supported ultra-low tax jurisdictions and elaborate structures for cheating tax. And it is these things which are so harmful, not only to ordinary people in developed countries but also to the developing world.

I am now a philosophy professor, using teaching and writing to campaign instead of massive balloons. And if anything, my research has shown how the harm caused to the developing world is now even more undeniable. Perhaps six years ago Bono could be forgiven for not accepting the message of our campaign. But in a dramatic turn around, even the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development is now warning of the damage to the developing world caused by profit shifting. Bono has responded by expressing horror that a company he has invested in has broken rules. However, it is at best naive not to assume that elaborate company structures involving low-tax jurisdictions are set up for the purpose of shifting profits.

Of course this is partly about regulation. The international tax rules were designed for an era before globalisation and technological advances made global profit-shifting possible, and they are no longer fit for purpose. But while lax regulation makes tax cheating possible, when wealthy individuals like Bono "shop around" different countries for the best tax deal they fan the flames of tax competition, putting ever more pressure on countries around the world to cut their tax rates.

This leads to a race to the bottom in which around the world there is ever less money for schools, hospitals and the public good. Tax competition also undermines democratic self-determination. It ought to be the prerogative of legitimate governments to decide on the appropriate level of tax. By creating the downward pressure of tax competition, wealthy individuals limit the choices of sovereign states.

The rallying cry for Brexit was to "take back control". In fact, it is not the EU that is sapping our self-determination, but the wealthy individuals and transnational corporations that hold countries to ransom through the mechanism of tax competition. Bono and Drummond have good intentions. But what they can't see is that our current economic system is not working either for the developing world or for ordinary people in the developed world. If we want to help the developing world, we need to oppose that system – not encourage it.

• Philip Goff is associate professor in philosophy at Central European University in Budapest

[TabClear]

Don't necessarily agree with all this but some interesting points:

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/nov/07/tax-bono-harming-world-poorest-glastonbury-avoidance-paradise-papers

Tax rogues like Bono are harming the world's poorest people

In 2011 I organised a protest at U2's headline gig at Glastonbury. As Bono sang The Fly, a 9ft wide, 24ft high balloon was inflated at the front of the audience bearing the words U PAY TAX 2?. The protest was prompted by U2's decision in 2006 to move their tax affairs from Ireland to the Netherlands, after the Irish government decided to cap the tax-free exemption on royalties at €225,000 (before this, artists in Ireland were not obliged to pay any tax on royalties). The aim of the action was to highlight the impact of transnational tax dodging on the developing world. In a chilling report, Christian Aid estimated that $160bn is lost to the developing world each year as profits made in poorer countries are shifted to wealthier tax havens.

A few days before the protest, the co-founder of Bono's charity One, Jamie Drummond, telephoned me to try to persuade me to call off the action, citing worries that we might undermine Bono's campaigning efforts. We had a long conversation in which I eventually suggested that, regardless of what we do, Bono's tax affairs will inevitably cast a shadow over his campaigning. At this point Drummond became slightly aggressive, and insisted that it was our actions alone that were doing damage.

With the recent Paradise Papers revelations concerning Bono's finances, it looks like my prediction has come to pass. Bono chose to invest in a company based in ultra-low tax Malta, which incorporated a Lithuanian company – in order to buy a shopping centre – which has paid no tax in Lithuania despite having made profits. The company was later transferred to zero-tax (on company profits) Guernsey. To be fair to Bono, he is not creating artificial structures in order to avoid paying tax on his income (the kind of practice adopted by some of the stars of Mrs Brown's Boys). However, by making this investment, he supported ultra-low tax jurisdictions and elaborate structures for cheating tax. And it is these things which are so harmful, not only to ordinary people in developed countries but also to the developing world.

I am now a philosophy professor, using teaching and writing to campaign instead of massive balloons. And if anything, my research has shown how the harm caused to the developing world is now even more undeniable. Perhaps six years ago Bono could be forgiven for not accepting the message of our campaign. But in a dramatic turn around, even the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development is now warning of the damage to the developing world caused by profit shifting. Bono has responded by expressing horror that a company he has invested in has broken rules. However, it is at best naive not to assume that elaborate company structures involving low-tax jurisdictions are set up for the purpose of shifting profits.

Of course this is partly about regulation. The international tax rules were designed for an era before globalisation and technological advances made global profit-shifting possible, and they are no longer fit for purpose. But while lax regulation makes tax cheating possible, when wealthy individuals like Bono "shop around" different countries for the best tax deal they fan the flames of tax competition, putting ever more pressure on countries around the world to cut their tax rates.

This leads to a race to the bottom in which around the world there is ever less money for schools, hospitals and the public good. Tax competition also undermines democratic self-determination. It ought to be the prerogative of legitimate governments to decide on the appropriate level of tax. By creating the downward pressure of tax competition, wealthy individuals limit the choices of sovereign states.

The rallying cry for Brexit was to "take back control". In fact, it is not the EU that is sapping our self-determination, but the wealthy individuals and transnational corporations that hold countries to ransom through the mechanism of tax competition. Bono and Drummond have good intentions. But what they can't see is that our current economic system is not working either for the developing world or for ordinary people in the developed world. If we want to help the developing world, we need to oppose that system – not encourage it.

• Philip Goff is associate professor in philosophy at Central European University in Budapest

He does make some valid points about the "race to the bottom" and tax laws not keeping up with technology. But my view is that this is a governance issue and its the legislators who should be held to account for it, not the individuals. Pay the money to employ some proper, shit hot tax advisers to draft the legislation (not some career civil servant) or engage a Big 4 firm on a proper, incentivised contract (% of tax saved??) to close the loopholes. You can bet that if KPMG/PWC/Deloitte were getting a £ for every £100 saved through closing some of these schemes they would have things locked down pretty tight.

There is an attempt through the OECD/ G20 Base Erosion and Profit Shifting (BEPS) legislation to eliminate  tax planning strategies that exploit gaps and mismatches in tax rules to artificially shift profits to low or no-tax locations where there is little or no economic activity. Although some of the schemes used are illegal, most are not. I think about 100 jurisdictions have signed up but the issue in this is the "unilateral" element, i.e. act 1st and you get stung. The Irish experience is pretty fresh in terms of the investment that can attracted through a low tax regime and other countries dont want to move first in case it jeopardized the multinationals setting up in their parish. Ironically the USA were probably the one country that could tax the corporates a sensible amount because people wanted to trade there so badly. However, with the current moron at the helm over there he is seeking to redress this and  in his usual overreacting manner giving a big f**k You to everyone else.