Quote:
Originally Posted by martyh
That is not even close to being a valid comparison .Beer ,wine, coffee are all legal highs,Cannabis is getting ever closer to being legal ,the point is that legislation changes and evolves as society changes and evolves .
The biggest problem that HMRC have is that past court cases have set precedents that cannot simply be ignored .The government has spent a lot of time setting up GAAR legislation to counteract these precedents set by courts
such as these judgements
These judgements have been used for over 70 yrs and only recently have the GAAR regulations set them aside
A worthwhile read |
Yes it is valid, and I don't understand why you disagree with that? What you wrote doesn't contradict but provide an example of it. If the law is constantly evolving, it is because people are always trying to find ways to go around, rather than break it. Tax law is an especially good example.
I fully support the right of people to optimise their tax affairs in a legal, transparent manner. I cannot support those who invent blatantly illegal schemes that are only "legal" because of a change of a formally illegal scheme to avoid the bit they got caught for last time.
Funnily enough, most of the problems in this leak are money laundering, conflicts of interest and sanctions evasion. None of those things are going to fly and need looking at. The Tax avoiding bits to be fair look like standard and well used methods and while a debate on tax havens is a legitimate one, it is a separate one.
However, while you are indeed right in saying people have the right to manage their tax affairs without meddling, they do not have the right to lie to HMRC. While the likes of Google, the Guardian, Starbucks etc are aggressive tax avoiders, they are also relatively simple to see what they're doing, whether you like the schemes or not is another matter. A millionaire declaring an income of a pittance and paying little tax, while operating a company provided by Mossack Fonseca (And not declaring ownership to HMRC) is getting rather close to tax evasion, especially if it's used to evade CGT.