Panama Papers

Maverick2332 said:
That's pretty disgusting.

"Let the poor pay their taxes, I'm too rich for that."
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No one's stopping you (or anyone else on the moral outrage bus) voluntarily getting out their cheque book and donating extra 'tax' to HMRC; they will happily take your money! But then why should you? You've paid what you legally owe. As has someone much wealthier who may use off-shore facilities, as long as it is all done within the confines of the law.
 
Hambut_Bulge said:
No one's stopping you (or anyone else on the moral outrage bus) voluntarily getting out their cheque book and donating extra 'tax' to HMRC; they will happily take your money! But then why should you? You've paid what you legally owe. As has someone much wealthier who may use off-shore facilities, as long as it is all done within the confines of the law.
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All good,

Human slavery is pretty much legal in Saudi arabia. Hey at least it's within the confines of the law bro! stop hating! just tryna keep some slaves you know, why you got beef?

Or how about the legal age of consent in some places being 10 years old? hey bro stop hating! it's within the law she's legal bruv.
 
Kemik said:
In theory, I totally agree. However, if you could rewrite the tax system from fresh what would be your overall rule for how much income someone should pay tax on?
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The rules are fine as they are, they just need to be enforced robustly. The problem is that tax evasion is treated as tax avoidance until it's proven otherwise in court. Instead of letting these people off saying, "oh just pay us what you owe now please", send a few of them to prison for 10 years. I rather think you'll suddenly see a lot of money coming back to the UK from tax havens.
 
Pudney said:
Unfortunately I understand this area and I can see the many flaws in peoples moral outrage. I've never been one to judge others before the facts are known and if that means I don't fall in to mob mentality then so be it. I'd rather look at this rationally than join in with the crowd and get outraged on something I have no details on and just have to make up reasons to get outraged.

Of course, if you have actual facts on how Cameron's Dad avoided UK tax on his UK activities then I'll happily listen. But at the moment nothing has been shown.
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You clearly don't, because this is much bigger than just tax avoidance. There are corrupt government officials (from around the world, before you spout out "ERMERHGERD WHERE'S THE EVIDENCE OF UK GOVERTMENT DOING THIS?!?") syphoning public money into offshore account via this company. There are drug cartels laundering their money via this company. There are multinational corporations hiding their money in secret accounts to avoid paying enormous tax bills that literally rob the countries of much needed healthcare and other vital services via this company.

Then there are the smaller matters such as Cameron's dad's money.

How's this for moral outrage?

Cameron in 2012: What Jimmy Carr has done to avoid tax is reprehensible.
Cameron in 2016: My family's investments are a private matter and not the concern of the public.

Nothing to hide, nothing to fear, eh?
 
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scorza said:
The rules are fine as they are, they just need to be enforced robustly. The problem is that tax evasion is treated as tax avoidance until it's proven otherwise in court. Instead of letting these people off saying, "oh just pay us what you owe now please", send a few of them to prison for 10 years. I rather think you'll suddenly see a lot of money coming back to the UK from tax havens.
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But that's not what a lot of people in the thread are saying. It looks like they're saying if you are wealthy all of your income, globally, should be declared in the UK with tax paid at the marginal rate.

In reality, the US apply those rules but people do anything they can to get around them.

The UK really doesn't have a high level of tax evasion. The debate on tax avoidance usually comes down to people being upset with high net worth individuals not paying tax as if they were employee earning that a a salary, or they are upset with companies like facebook. The good news is that changes to the tax rules over the past few years mean that those companies are effectively forced to change the way they operate.
 
CREATIVE!11 said:
All good,

Human slavery is pretty much legal in Saudi arabia. Hey at least it's within the confines of the law bro! stop hating! just tryna keep some slaves you know, why you got beef?

Or how about the legal age of consent in some places being 10 years old? hey bro stop hating! it's within the law she's legal bruv.
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Well you're just setting up a straw man there. We're not arguing about things that are already illegal in this country
 
Kemik said:
But that's not what a lot of people in the thread are saying. It looks like they're saying if you are wealthy all of your income, globally, should be declared in the UK with tax paid at the marginal rate.
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Iain Cameron, Blairmore Inc.

A UK citizen set up an offshore company, held meetings outside of the UK for the specific reason of not paying tax in the UK.
 
OldCoals said:
Iain Cameron, Blairmore Inc.

A UK citizen set up an offshore company, held meetings outside of the UK for the specific reason of not paying tax in the UK.
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What's wrong with that?

If I set up a company in Ireland and held my board meetings in Ireland would you be going after me for the same thing?

If the company has operations in the UK then it will pay tax on its UK operations. If the UK citizen is resident in the UK then he will pay tax on the dividends or employment income from that company.
 
Kemik said:
What's wrong with that?

If I set up a company in Ireland and held my board meetings in Ireland would you be going after me for the same thing?

If the company has operations in the UK then it will pay tax on its UK operations. If the UK citizen is resident in the UK then he will pay tax on the dividends or employment income from that company.
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The whole point of organisations like this is to hide your assets so you don't have to pay tax!
 
OldCoals said:
The whole point of organisations like this is to hide your assets so you don't have to pay tax!
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No, no, I'm sure they go through all these convoluted proceedures, employing firms who pride themselves on their secrecy, paying large fees and then completely declare all their income to the relevant authorities for tax purposes.
 
OldCoals said:
The whole point of organisations like this is to hide your assets so you don't have to pay tax!
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Would you say the same thing if I had a parent holding company in Ireland for the UK operations?

Just to break it down:

Let's assume I am not resident in the UK.

(A) If I made lots of money abroad, was not UK resident and decided to put it in Ireland it wouldn't be any of HMRC's business.

(B) If I made the money in the UK then I would be appropriately taxed in the UK. The income net of UK tax would then be sat in my fat cat bank account in Ireland, making investment income or interest and HMRC wouldn't be able to touch the income because it isn't anything to do with the UK.

IF I am a UK resident and UK domiciled then if I don't declare the income on either of (A) or (B) then I would be committing tax evasion.

It's not the act of setting up the company in other countries that is the "dirty" thing. It is whether or not they are declared to the fullest extent of the law or appropriately deemed residence that is the problem. If they give bearer bonds to a company in this country and say they don't have any assets as a UK resident then HMRC should screw them when they get the income back.
 
Hambut_Bulge said:
Well you're just setting up a straw man there. We're not arguing about things that are already illegal in this country
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No i'm not, I just get bored of the "oh it's legal" arguement. Like I said there are plenty of legal things which are considered morally repulsive.

Like I said, just because it's legal doesn't mean it's right (and at the end of the day it's still just use of loopholes...). Whilst some guy on a low wage pays his taxes and struggles to make ends meet, do you think he finds it unfair someone else who is a hell of a lot richer doesn't pay anything because he can afford to hire a creative accountant?

Of course, because he's of sound mind. Nobody likes taxes, suck it up. If you want to live in society, pay them or go live in the woods.

Even if we had a flat tax rate you can bet people would still tax avoid.

OldCoals said:
What is wrong with forcing these dependencies to comply with UK tax law?
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Lmao....... this x1000, what is going through this guys head. If they were independant then yeah but no... but the fact is they're dependencies.
 
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