[Osem]

Tackling the myriad of tax avoidance schemes would be rather like trying to stop a colander leaking using the fingers of one hand I'd have thought. If HMG is going down the prohibition route wouldn't it make more sense to make all forms of tax avoidance illegal with the only exceptions being schemes which HMG has specifically given approval to such as ISA's etc. Having said that, I'd imagine doing any of this in a retrospective manner is going to result in a whole load of protracted, complex and extremely expensive legal cases which HMG has no guarantee of winning.