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Labour rent their London HQ from an offshore trust (imho a perfectly normal thing to do - hold a property asset in such a trust)
https://order-order.com/2017/11/06/labour-rent-hq-offshore-trust/
Tom as I posted many times on the Trump thread I would have voted for Hillary but with a heavy heart - the better of two very poor candidates. The Democrats are way to the right of our Tories fwiw imo
I suspect there are few on here as anti as me re non Doms, I have had colleagues and a boss (owner of firm I worked for) who had that status. Its a disgraceful and humungous tax dodge.
Oh look, our old friends Apple are involved again...just how profitable does the most profitable company in the world need to be?
Their greed annoys me more than any individual.
What exactly has Hamilton done? Is it just a more complex version of not paying vat on a company vehicle when he uses it privately? So pretty much the same as every "white van man" then?
[url= https://www.cnbc.com/2017/11/06/tax-avoidance-is-a-legacy-issue-oecds-angel-gurria-says.html ]Important to get a sense of perspective[/url]
Bottom line is that most people will try and get away with paying tax if they can.
No. No they don’t.
I’m not sure I could give many you-know-what’s about Lewis Hamilton doing that Tax Haven of the IOM out of some VAT on a plane that might only visit the UK 2-3 times a year.
The problem is journalists just don't understand how this stuff works.
Don’t let facts spoil the fun. Great to see how well our future Chancellor understands the issues here
Triple latte please !!!!
Wailing and gnashing of teeth from the BBC regarding Naughty Apple.
What I missed was the part where they said they wouldn't buy or help promote Shiny Apple's products until Naughty Apple paid tax where it earned its money.
A lot of Journalists understand far better the rules than the perpetrators of these incidents. Whilst they may flail around and provoke to get a story, the days of wading in not knowing the subject matter have been and gone.
Don’t forget we’ve become more atuned to the myriad types of corruption and tax dodging because we’ve been hearing the same stories from the same people, who’ve accurately reported stories of those doing the said dodging and been caught for well over 10 years at least.. and those same journalists are well versed who to go for for investigation and background checks.
Whilst you might not like them for who they are and some of the methods they invoke, they’ve helped out corruption and manipulation over recent history. You only have to look back less than 10 years, to the MPs expenses scandals and such, for proven journalistic success in bringing out to justice those who were corrupt.
They’re one reason I’m sitting back and relaxing whilst all this goes on, knowing full well that they will out the corrupt.
Exactly, post the Panama papers these revelations seen tamer, tax avoidance becoming as anathema as drink driving, more hysteria please!
The term 'Tax Haven', is immediately suggestive of tax avoidance.
That’s why campaigners use the term
No bigger tax havens than Lixembourg and Ireland where even with tax rates as low as 12.5% companies can strike a deal with the government and pay very close to zero. Apple puts 60% of its global profits through Ireland and paid less than 1% on well over €100 billion !! The Irish government which had to be bailed out by the eurozone and took €5bn loan from the UK has the termity to say it will not collect the €13bn the EU says it must and has taken legal action via the ECJ to ensure they collect.
@devient Apple execs get paid on stock performance (and in shares to boot) and nothing helps the stock price like not paying taxes on your earnings. Shareholders like that too of course. Its the same story with Uber, Facebook, Google, Starbucks etc etc. At least Trump has a possible solution, cut tax rates to same as Ireland and encourage (strong arm ?) Apple to repatriate profits back to the US.
All lf this and we’ve headlines about the Queen 😥
One of the very few good things about Brexit is that is will mean Britain can tax Apple, Starbucks, Google etc. on their profits related to UK turnover.
I agree with jamba. 😯
It does seem that once again the press go for the cheap headline rather than the 'important' stuff...
^^^ I F-ing hope so Edukator. Its one of the things I have been banging on to my MP about. I however fear the EU will try and ensare us to ensure they don’t lose the handful of jobs in Ireland and Luxembourg these cushy tax deals support.
It’s far too easy for companies to play governments off against each other. Luxembourg is Europes richest country in terms of gdp per head.
All lf this and we’ve headlines about the Queen
Do keep up jambs....
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as for taxing apple more after Brexit?
Wasnt it May/Hammonds plan to do the opposite?
especially when Tory & UKIP MEPs have a history of voting against efforts to clampdown on corporate tax evasion
What really makes my blood boil is when the BBC supports tax avoidance on performers incomes. That's licence fee tax payers money.
A lot of it's not. BBC earns a lot of cash from overseas networks buying their programmes AFAIK.
One of the very few good things about Brexit is that is will mean Britain can tax Apple, Starbucks, Google etc. on their profits related to UK turnover.
Lolz! I bet you 5 € they don't! And that'll be a lot of money for me in the near future 🙂
Greatest number of non dom's where registered during the Blair/Brown era FWIW
@Kimbers what you are doing (and it's not just you it's just you posted above) is trying to turn this into some sort of political / class war bollix
World’s fastest u-turn. Worthy of Lewis Hamilton. Speaking of...
Sod going after Apple, lock up everyone involved with Mrs Brown's Boys (whether they tax evade or not)
#confused
Bainbrge/mefty = nothing to see here look away.
Jamba = the papers have it wrong it's the Beeb and and non doms.
Kimbers = it's the toffs doing their toff things again.
Not sure who is correct but it doesn't seem right anyone should be able to avoid paying tax whilst we have such underfunded public services.
Would something really bad happen if we didn't have tax avoidance schemes?
Thing is, it's real easy to say "it's not very honest trying to avoid paying tax" when you have no money yourself. But, as you'd find out if you are ever lucky enough to make some serious money, the FIRST thing you do is try to minimse how much of it you give away!
OK, for people with Millions or Billions it's different, but for the average person, tax loop holes, immoral or not, make a huge difference to one's standard of life on sums around say £500k.
But, as you'd find out if you are ever lucky enough to make some serious money, the FIRST thing you do is try to minimse how much of it you give away!
Why though?
If you win £100m on the lottery, would you get all upset if you had to pay £50m in tax? £50m suddenly not good enough for you? You're right, many people would be gutted to have to give away £50m. But if you gave them £50m tax free they'd be thrilled.
So what does that tell us about the psychology of money?
Kimbers = it's the toffs doing their toff things again.
Madame Guillotine is the only solution here
In more than happy to see Mrs Brown's Boys get the chop too tho, for the sake of balance.
Wonder how much money relating to arms trafficking, the global drugs trade and the intelligence services is handled offshore...
One of the very few good things about Brexit is that is will mean Britain can tax Apple, Starbucks, Google etc. on their profits related to UK turnover.
It won't.
A lot of it's not. BBC earns a lot of cash from overseas networks buying their programmes AFAIK.
Licence fee £3.7 billion, BBC Worldwide generates £200 million so about 5%.
Bainbrge/mefty = nothing to see here look away.
It depends on what you are looking at. When it comes to most funds, such as the ones that the Duchy of Lancaster invested in, then no there is not alot to see.
The Mrs Brown's Boys is a straight avoidance scheme that probably doesn't work, it looks like the IceBreaker type scheme which has lost its appeals.
Apple is, as I have said many times before, principally a case of US tax avoidance.
But, as you'd find out if you are ever lucky enough to make some serious money, the FIRST thing you do is try to minimse how much of it you give away!
Which is why the opportunity should not exist.
Wonder how much money relating to arms trafficking, the global drugs trade and the intelligence services is handled offshore...
Lots..which is why the opportunity should not exist.
So are the grown ups going to do something about it or are we leaving it for our kids to sort out?
To quote the oracle that is King in Platoon.
Everybody know the poor are always being ****ed over by the rich. Always have, always will.
The question really isn't whether greedy bastards will do anything to get richer, that's a given. The question is what are normal folk going to do about it? Maybe the bolsheviks had one or two things right.
@Wilbur
Think I’m saying “some things to be angry about here, but obscured by spam about non issues like the Queen’s investments”.
Also, and this is an even worse slogan - the only possible solution to stop offshore tax avoidance is full harmonisation of tax regimes between countries. Which is clearly not going to happen, nor should it because competing/incentivising through the tax system is a perfectly valid thing to do for a nation state.
No wonder people are angry enough to vote for trump, Brexit, lepenn etc
So people who voted for Brexit, Trump because they are sick of getting screwed by the rich will end up helping the rich avoid tax. How ironic!
Trump still refuses to release his tax returns too.
One of the very few good things about Brexit is that is will mean Britain can tax Apple, Starbucks, Google etc. on their profits related to UK turnover.
😯
it looks like the IceBreaker type scheme which has lost its appeals.
It doesn't actually it looks like the K2 scheme which hasn't been litigated yet, but I would expect it to be.
Here’s a quick question... who here has ever bought duty free whilst on holiday....?
Who has bought chalk and who has bought cheese?
I once bought a luxury yacht at Stanstead.
So the question is then does the benefit of this
competing/incentivising through the tax system is a perfectly valid thing to do for a nation state.
offset the loss of income to the exchequer? Do we all share in that benefit?
Can we remove the bits that arent advantageous whilst keeping the bits that are?
kimbersCoz I get taxed on the measly interest i get from my piss poor savings account !
[url= https://moneyfacts.co.uk/guides/savings/how-are-my-savings-taxed/ ]No you don't[/url]
[i]Every basic rate taxpayer in the UK now has a Personal Savings Allowance of £1,000. This means that the first £1,000 of savings interest earned in a year is tax-free. [/i]
Or are you telling us that you have circa £330k at say 0.3% in your measly savings account and are earning more than £1,000 p.a. interest?
offset the loss of income to the exchequer? Do we all share in that benefit?
Look at the mess inside the EU too
The problem with the tax competition is its gone far beyond setting low rates headline like Ireland and Luxembourg - its now about negotiating a deal with the government so you pay as close to zero as you can get away with (Apple 0.8% effective tax rate, Amazon 75% European profits taxed at zero in Luxembourg).
Ireland clearly feel they have plenty of money for schools and hospitals as they are refusing to collect the €13bn from Apple
“Duty free” there are limits on quantities. I fail to see how Apple got a duty free limit of $250 billion and counting
A good case study of how offshore shell companies are used comes from the [url= https://www.theguardian.com/baefiles/page/0,,2095840,00.html ]Al-Yamamah deal[/url]...
But the MoD was still lobbying abroad on BAE's behalf and running huge government-to-government contracts, particularly the Saudi al-Yamamah deal.Instead of fulfilling their international promises, officials merely tried to put more distance between themselves and the companies doing the bribery.
What it did was not illegal, but the firm constructed what might well be called a global money-laundering machine.
The system was run from a secure block, Warwick House, at BAE's Farnborough premises. "HQ Marketing Services " was [b]headed by Hugh Dickinson, who was also responsible for company liaison with MI6[/b]. His long-serving deputy was Julia Aldridge.
For a supposedly reputable public company, the methods used were surprising.Britain's Serious Fraud Office later concluded: "The whole system is maintained in such conditions of secrecy that there is a legitimate suspicion concerning the real purpose of the payments."
BAE set up a front company called Novelmight Ltd. With the help of the Swiss branch of its bankers, Lloyds TSB, the firm discreetly rented a high-security office in Geneva, on the sixth floor of a block at 48 Route des Acacias.Video surveillance cameras were installed, along with an encrypted fax and phone system. A specialist from the UK was flown out to sweep the vault for bugs. Then, [b]just before Britain signed up to the OECD convention in 1997, the filing cabinets and safes containing the agent details were loaded into a van and driven by trusted staff from Farnborough to Geneva.[/b]
[b]
BAE added a new layer of concealment when the convention came into force in 1999. Novelmight was officially closed down as a UK-registered subsidiary.[/b][b]But it was secretly re-registered as an offshore entity in the British Virgin Islands, a financial "black hole" in the Caribbean where beneficial ownership can be hidden. Now there was apparently no paperwork at all to link BAE with Novelmight.[/b]
When the agreements were ready to be made or renewed, Dickinson or Aldridge flew to Geneva and unlocked the office at Route des Acacias for the signing.The contracts were kept in Geneva and could only be inspected there.
The purpose of these tortuous arrangements seems to have been to ensure that nothing questionable involving the hiring of agents took place within UK legal jurisdiction.
But a further secret payment system was also needed for BAE to transfer large sums in cash to those agents.
BAE used offshore front companies once again. In February 1998, "Red Diamond Trading Ltd" was anonymously incorporated in the British Virgin Islands. It was used to channel payments all over the world, via Red Diamond accounts in London, Switzerland and New York.We have traced secret payments going to agents in South America, Tanzania, Romania, South Africa, Qatar, Chile and the Czech Republic.
The next year, BAE set up a second front company, purely to handle the Saudi commission payments for al-Yamamah. "Poseidon Trading Investments Ltd" was incorporated in the British Virgin Islands on June 25 1999.
[b]
Those close to it say more than £1bn has passed through its accounts to Saudi agents, in transfers made by Lloyds TSB.[/b]A different method was used to disguise corrupt benefits for Saudi officials who went on vacation trips to the US and Europe. This was what became known as BAE's "slush fund".
Bear in mind that's just a snapshot of a vastly complex international network... which is of course linked to this:
and sewing the seeds that led to the terror attacks that have been suffered around the world.
No you don'tEvery basic rate taxpayer in the UK now has a Personal Savings Allowance of £1,000. This means that the first £1,000 of savings interest earned in a year is tax-free.
Or are you telling us that you have circa £330k at say 0.3% in your measly savings account and are earning more than £1,000 p.a. interest?
appologies
my savings account has a column for tax, its always 0, just assumed it was coz my savings were so low & the interest tiny!
apologiesmy savings account has a column for tax, its always 0, just assumed it was coz my savings were so low & the interest tiny!
Accepted
It's entirely unsurprising that megacorps are bending things their way, and Lewis Hamilton and his ilk have made no secret of living elsewhere for tax purposes and his lifestyle probably takes him towards non-dom status.
What bugged me was the content here ( https://www.theguardian.com/news/2017/nov/06/james-o-toole-tax-alchemist-assets-uk-paradise-papers) where people who were clearly resident and working in the UK transferred their assets and became advisors for the schemes that owned those assets.
On another occasion, he told the law firm he had been wearing a £25,000 Rolex that belonged to his cell company.“To ensure HMRC do not try to tax me on this as some form of benefit … I think it sensible for me to pay a rent for wearing the watch of £50 per month. I will make a payment of £300 covering back rent and set up a standing order covering future payments,” he said.
In response to an email from a client asking when some money would arrive in his account, O’Toole warned: “Can I ask there are no personal pronouns used in written correspondence please guys. Technically, the account belongs to a cell company which belongs to a trust. ‘The’ account, ‘the cell account’; anything buy [sic] ‘my’ account please.”
Bent.
This sums up my thoughts quite nicely:
[url= https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/nov/06/the-guardian-view-on-the-paradise-papers-a-light-on-murky-dealings ]https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/nov/06/the-guardian-view-on-the-paradise-papers-a-light-on-murky-dealings[/url]
If it is all legal and above board, why the secrecy?
Good to see bono's name popping up in there.
Telling governments the world over to spend our taxes to help the poor, whilst he squirrels away money offshore.
The hypocrisy of the man is disgusting..
Good to see bono's name popping up in there.Telling governments the world over to spend our taxes to help the poor, whilst he squirrels away money offshore.
The hypocrisy of the man is disgusting..
Yup, champagne swilling socialist dick'ead of the highest order.
Amen to that..
Rich millionaires telling us we are not donating enough is bad enough.. But it's the hypocrisy that really grates
[url= https://amp-theguardian-com.cdn.ampproject.org/v/s/amp.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/nov/15/benefit-scroungers-billions-rich-paradise-papers-tax-avoidance?amp_js_v=0.1#webview=1 ]Why do people care more about benefit ‘scroungers’ than billions lost to the rich?[/url]
I would like to know why too.
People equate hard work with money and laziness with lack of. So they assume those with wealth have worked hard rather than have been fortunate.
It's easier to spit on someone below you.