law is as squigie and uncomfortable as projectile
diarrhea.
It's so amazing that the little people who started
UKUncut not so long ago were motivated by
the well-kept secret that big international
companies were getting sweetheart deals from
HMRC, the UK taxman- paper scarecrows, as it
turns out.
I was blissfully unaware and yet they were
motivated and quickly scared the establishment.
Cops were deployed to save Vodafone, for ex.
Now, we are so aware. Nick Shaxson is on the case
and Richard Murphy and one day , somebody who
knows how to get things done, will actually do
something.
But, we owe it all to UKUncut. I came close to
joining them at Fortnum and Masons, but I was
too frugal to have a 3G phone.
I was on the public service march that day, and
passed right in front.
They went in, did a sit in and were lassooed by
the immoral London cops.
As Gandhi said: First they ignore you, then the
ridicule you, then they fight you, then you win.
checkit: The Guardian
Revealed:
'Sweetheart' tax deals each worth over £1bn
Exclusive:
Four corporations that reached settlements worth £4.5bn between them are among
those let off lightly
Rajeev Syal
Monday 29 April 2013 22.00
BST
Jump to comments (960)
Dave
Hartnett
A
document sent by Dave Hartnett, the ex-head of tax at HMRC, to the exchequer
secretary at the Treasury, describes the tax deals. Photograph: Sarah
Lee/Guardian
The
scale of the government's "sweetheart" tax deals – individual secret
agreements drawn up between tax officials and corporations to settle disputes –
can be revealed for the first time after previously unseen documents showed
that just four settlements were worth £4.5bn between them.
A
leaked document sent by Dave Hartnett,
the former head of tax at HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC), to David Gauke,
the exchequer secretary at the Treasury, discloses the figure, which has not
been released by HMRC before on the grounds of preserving "taxpayer confidentiality".[LISTED
CORPorations have to reveal their books anyway, so I call "bullshit" - Costick67]
The
document describes deals in excess of
£1bn as "not uncommon". The size of the figure has been seized
upon by MPs and tax campaigners who want HMRC to release details of how much
tax was owed by each of the four unnamed companies before the deals were
struck.
Margaret
Hodge, the chair of the Commons public accounts committee, said: "If we
got £4.5bn in, how much did we not get? That is what taxpayers will want to
know, and I'll be raising this with HMRC through the committee.
"Whilst
it is in the interest of the government to collect monies, these are huge sums.
If there were deals involved, we need to know that the companies paid a fair
amount on the profits they made from their businesses in the UK."
The
revelation comes as separate documents disclosed in the Guardian show that tax
officials used intrusive investigative powers designed to help them catch
serious criminals to try to prove that the whistleblower who uncovered one of
the first sweetheart deals, involving Goldman Sachs, had spoken to the
Guardian.
The
belongings, emails, internet search records and telephone calls of HMRC
solicitor Osita Mba and the mobile phone records of his wife, Claudia, were
examined by HMRC investigators using powers to investigate criminals, the
previously undisclosed documents reveal. In 2011 Mba disclosed the existence of
the Goldman Sachs deal by passing information to two parliamentary committees
and the National Audit Office (NAO) under whistleblowing legislation.
The
disclosures about the multibillion-pound scale of the government's deals come
from a seven-page memo sent by Hartnett in December 2011 as he asked for public
support from Gauke in the face of growing criticism in the media and
parliament.
He
wrote: "In 2006, HMRC adopted a new approach to reaching tax settlements
with large business through building
constructive relationships and encouraging mutual openness and
transparency, increasing certainty for business and reducing the time taken to
resolve issues.
"Settlements
of above £1bn are now not uncommon and £4.5bn … has come from just four
settlements with bespoke governance."
A
2011 NAO inquiry into the four settlements found that they were made outside
the high risk corporates programme set up in 2006 to ensure proper governance
of deals with corporations.
Hartnett
claimed in his submission to Gauke that the programme had allowed the
government to bring in an extra £9bn in revenue in total – a figure previously
disclosed to parliament. MPs on two select committees have claimed that the
deals are secretive and allow
corporations to develop a cosy relationship with tax officials.
The
£4.5bn figure is believed to include a previously reported Vodafone deal which
ended when the telecoms giant paid £1.25bn.
A
committee of MPs was told that the Vodafone tax bill should have been £6bn or
more. That figure is disputed by Vodafone.
The
£4.5bn does not include, however, the relatively small Goldman Sachs agreement
when the bank was let off paying up to £20m.
The
revelations will be of interest to solicitors for the anti-tax avoidance
organisation UK Uncut who on Thursday are taking HMRC to the high court,
claiming that the deal which let off Goldman Sachs from paying up to £20m in
interest charges was unlawful.
Anna
Walker, a spokesperson for UK Uncut Legal Action, which campaigns on tax
issues, said: "It is not legally, politically or morally acceptable to let
big business off paying the tax that they owe. David Cameron and George
Osborne's government's claims that they are leading the world in clamping down
on tax ring hollow as these backroom 'sweetheart' deals come to light and no
real action is taken."
The
high court will hear UK Uncut's claims
that Goldman tried to funnel employees' bonuses through an offshore tax scheme
based in the British Virgin Islands, avoiding paying national insurance
contributions.
HMRC
admits it made a mistake in reaching a deal with Goldman, resulting in
underpayment of interest on the tax due. But it argues that it acted lawfully
in doing so. The hearing is expected to last for one day.
