With a PM like Cameron, it’s no surprise government deliberately sidesteps effective tax avoidance strategies

Last Updated: April 19, 2016By

160420mossackfonseca

“Dear HMRC,

“To your question, “did I have any occasions of non-compliance in the last six years?” the answer is yes.

“In mitigation – and let me be clear on this – I can assure you that lessons have been learned and I am now a new, reformed organisation.

“With regards,

“David Cameron Offshore Holdings plc”

After the Panama leaks, the Conservative government is desperately trying to portray itself as the scourge of organised tax avoidance. It is consulting on draft legislation which would introduce a new corporate criminal offence of failure to prevent the criminal facilitation of tax evasion. Such promises have become part of impression management, but have rarely delivered.

A good case study of the smoke and mirrors tax avoidance policies is the government’s much trumpeted Guidance on Promoting Tax Compliance and Procurement. These rules came into effect on 1st April 2013 and were meant to ensure that organisations engaged in tax avoidance/evasion are barred from securing public contracts.

Of course, that would upset the government’s wealthy backers and giant corporations. So they were designed to be inadequate. They applied only to central government contracts of above five million pounds. The rules do not apply to local government’s £12 billion procurement or other public bodies.  They are only asked to look at the practicality of applying the government’s guidance.

The rules require bidders to self-certify whether during the previous six years they have had any ‘occasions of non-compliance’ i.e. whether they have submitted an incorrect tax return because of their engagement in tax evasion. If so, the bidder is asked to submit an explanatory statement and offer mitigating factors. These could be: ‘we are under new management’, ‘culprits have been fired’, ‘we have learnt lessons and are now a new reformed organisation’, etc.

This self-certification only applies to the company bidding for the contract and not to the entire group of companies. Thus, one subsidiary could be engaged in tax evasion whilst another can bid for the public contracts. None of the documents are publicly available and thus cannot be scrutinised by citizens. The rules do not require the government purchasing departments to verify the claims made by the bidder.

In any case, the chances of a resource starved business friendly HMRC securing a tax evasion conviction against a major corporation are miniscule. HMRC’s staff numbers have been declined from 91,000 in 2005 to about 56,000 in 2015, and further staff cuts are planned.

HMRC’s financial resources have also been cut in real terms, even though investigating tax avoidance is a resource intensive task, especially when the other side can marshal armies of accountants and lawyers. Cases can drag on for a decade or so before being resolved.  By its own admission, HMRC claims to have the capacity to investigate only about 35 wealthy tax evaders a year.

Source: Smoke and Mirrors: Government deliberately sidesteps effective tax avoidance strategies | Left Foot Forward

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5 Comments

  1. Rik April 20, 2016 at 12:40 am - Reply

    So it’s a win win for these tory cronies then…

  2. jeffrey davies April 20, 2016 at 5:34 am - Reply

    no they rather go after the peasants its easier for them

  3. casalealex April 20, 2016 at 8:03 am - Reply

    “Nobody disagrees that Britain sits, spider-like, at the centre of a vast international web of tax havens, hoovering up trillions of dollars’ worth of business and capital around the globe funnelling it up to the City of London.

    Nobody denies that there is something extremely peculiar about the City of London Corporation, Britain’s ancient and fortress-like internal ‘off-shore island’, which has resisted waves of turbulent waves of history over the centuries, while casting a protective, almost invisible umbrella over the banks. Nobody denies this is a gigantic tax haven.

    Despite some vigorous efforts, nobody has come close to overturning the research or analysis showing the sheer scale of the harm wreaked on the world by these elitist, criminal-infested libertarian paradises, these silent battering rams of tax-cutting and financial deregulation.

    And despite a lot of hot air on the general subject, nobody has even tried to knock holes in my particular arguments about how tax havens were a central ingredient in the global financial crisis; or how they are among the best friends Big Finance ever had.

    For those who still think tax havens are merely about small islands, tax, and a few mafiosi types, these arguments will make little sense.

    For those who understand what – and, crucially, where – the tax havens are, the rest follows naturally. As world history has unfolded over the past year, story after story has confirmed my analysis.” Nicholas Shaxson

    Read more: Tax Havens and the Men who Stole the World.

  4. Barry Davies April 20, 2016 at 9:55 am - Reply

    So instead of the only thing in life you can be certain off is death and taxes should be re written to the only you can be sure of in life if you are a poor to average money holder and honest is death and taxes if you are rich it is only death.

  5. mrmarcpc April 21, 2016 at 4:02 pm - Reply

    Camoron and all the other tax avoiding scumbags will get away with it, offshore Dave should be out of number 10 but he isn’t and will brazen it out like they always do because we the people are too bloody useless and spineless to demand his resignation!

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