Brown changes tack on tax havens

I'm with Mark on this:

"Posturing
GB is simply desperate for anything to divert attention from his long standing appalling mismanagement of every aspect of the British economy. Having destroyed every other golden goose what better than to suggest that there's some miraculous large pool of cash that Britain can get its hands on to bail out the taxpayers. The truth is that 95% of the pain will be taken by the hard working people of Britain, an unfortunate minority. "

Don't forget GB flogged of the UK gold reserves at bargain basement prices. Who is he going to blame for that?

GB is simply desperate for anything to divert attention from his long standing appalling mismanagement of every aspect of the British economy. Having destroyed every other golden goose what better than to suggest that there's some miraculous large pool of cash that Britain can get its hands on to bail out the taxpayers. The truth is that 95% of the pain will be taken by the hard working people of Britain, an unfortunate minority.

James

The concept of Tax avoidance and tax Havens pre dates GBs moves on dividends / pension funds and I for one can recall how Dennis Healey had to raid and shut down Rossminster because of the overwhelming demand for their services and that was the late seventies

I daresay the moves on the pension funds is fairplay if thats what they have done and thats all the business processed in these juristictions

If its fairplay for these organisations to hide behind the skirts of pension funds and charities to justify their operations I will leave to the views of other participators of this blog

I really doubt if the top politicians will be minded to shop a pal or give up their individual tax efficient opportunities. It is not that long ago that offshore trusts were linked with some of our well off "leaders"
bill@wamstaxltd.com

I'd just say to Mark Busby that it was the action of Gordon Brown in imposing tax on dividends received by pension and insurance funds that caused the huge upsurge in investments moving offshore.

For example if a pension fund in the UK moves (legally) money offshore where it can be invested without suffering tax then who can blame them? When the money comes back to the UK it will be taxed and because it grew and was reinvested in a tax efficient manner there will be more tax payable in the UK - and more for the pensioner.

Let's not start discussing the effect GB's action had on UK pensions and mortgages at this stage.

This looks like another case of “weasel words”. Mr Brown is (as usual) saying one thing to grab headlines but when you look at what he is really saying the truth of the matter is somewhat different.

Brown does talk about “regulation” and that is the key to the issue. There are unregulated jurisdictions but there are also others who are regulated, often far better regulated, than the UK or other major nations. It wasn’t regulation of offshore jurisdictions which caused the crash in London, New York and elsewhere.

Have a look at this article for some background information:

http://www.link4business.info/2009/02/is-the-isle-of-man-really-a-tax-haven

It was said recently on Radio 4's Today programme that the worst tax haven is... errr... London, UK.

Shouldn't, therefore, Prime Minister Gordon Brown close down every financial business in the City of London so as to eradicate this problem once and for all?

Incidentally, the people with cash stashed away in these places think they should be called 'Tax Heavens.'

Given that the taxpayer controls RBS hopefully Gordon Brown wont find it beyond his capabilities to close down their Isle of Man tax evasion arm as a first step!

We ‘own’ the majority of tax havens e.g. Jersey, BVI, Gibraltar

So Gordon just sends them an email listing the tax rates they HAVE to use for CT and IT etc. in future.
If they don’t like it, that’s fine - they are independent countries from 1st Sept 2009.

PS. Is it time they sent UK some cash for all the services we give them e.g. free invasion service, the best armed forces etc….