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9am Lowdown: Deloitte sees female partners rise

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31st May 2016
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In this morning’s lowdown, Deloitte sees a rise in female partners, while HMRC fails to reclaim stamp duty from the sale of the Chelsea Barracks, and football ace Lionel Messi begins his tax evasion trial.

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Deloitte announces female partner rise

Deloitte has seen the highest year of female representation among its new partners, with 24 of 80 new partners in its UK business being female.

Deloitte still has a long way to go before reaching gender parity. According to the Guardian, this year’s results means that just 16% of the 1,054 partners in the firm’s UK division are female, which is a slight increase on 15% before the latest batch of promotions.

Deloitte chief exec, David Sproul admitted more still needs to be done to limit the gender gap, commenting: “Achieving greater gender diversity is a clear business imperative and these promotions evidence the success of the range of initiatives we have put in place.”

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HMRC fails in SDLT appeal

HMRC has lost in its appeal to retrieve £50m in stamp duty from the sale of the Chelsea Barracks to Qatar, after the court of appeal judged that HMRC pursued the wrong party.   

According to the BBC, the purchaser, a firm owned by the Qatar Investment Authority, had used a type of Islamic finance that meant a bank actually owned the property.

HMRC said in a statement: “The court of appeal ruling supports our view that SDLT [stamp duty land tax] is payable. We are disappointed that the decision makes that tax much harder to collect so we are considering an appeal,” it said in a statement.

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Messi tax evasion trial begins

Barcelona’s Lionel Messi is facing tax evasion charges today, where he is accused of using shell companies to avoid paying tax.

Messi’s father Jorge Horacio Messi also stands accused the three counts of tax fraud. The pair could be sentenced to over 22 months in prison if found guilty.

According to Forbes, Messi being associated in the Panama Papers blow out does not help his case, but jail does seem unlikely. Messi denies the accusation.

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