Jimmy Carr tax affairs 'morally wrong' - Cameron

Oh and if Dave wants to talk about what is morally repugnant perhaps he should take a look at the case of soldiers being made redundant days before their pension dates are met..Been very quiet on that one.

[dave6x]

Originally Posted by chris9991

Wonder if he will say if any of these are morally wrong in minimising the taxes that they pay in the UK

Google
Amazon
Vodafone
News International

I much prefer it when the law is guiding what is right or wrong, and not the PM deciding on a particular day what is right or wrong.

Well said, this country is losing £billions in corporate tax avoidance schemes, but I haven't heard Cameron attacking Amazon, etc !!!

every big business is the same and equally morally wrong and these said big businesses are what really run this country and not the government

[danielf]

If they don't like it then put a stop to it. Why this half-arsed approach where something is perfectly legal, and then appeal to people's moral judgement to not take advantage of it? Legislate against it and stop moaning ffs.

Originally Posted by danielf

If they don't like it then put a stop to it. Why this half-arsed approach where something is perfectly legal, and then appeal to people's moral judgement to not take advantage of it? Legislate against it and stop moaning ffs.

They will not do that they like having greased palms and without big business support their palms will only be sweaty lol

[danielf]

Originally Posted by tizmeinnit

They will not do that they like having greased palms and without big business support their palms will only be sweaty lol

Puts a whole different perspective on 'morally wrong' doesn't it?

[gazzae]

Originally Posted by Maggy J

I personally think all tax avoidance schemes are morally repugnant except the ones that pay for charity.Off shore,onshore I don't care.Pay the taxes you are supposed to pay.

I moved location with a company and took my relocation expenses in the form of a loan which would be written off if I left the company. This meant I paid 0% tax.
100% legal. Morally repugnant? Well I didn’t lose any sleep over it.

[Alan Fry]

I feel that HMRC need to chance its stance on Tax Evasion/Avoidance and crack down on it and reclaim tax money "stolen" from the goverment.

They should not leave any stone unturned and the sooner they do it the better

[tweetiepooh]

Surely one way to ensure expenses aren't cut by tax is for the payer to gross up the payment, pay the tax to HMRC and the receiver then gets the amount due? OK so the payer looses out (a little but they did force the expense) but the tax man and the receiver both gain.

[danielf]

I'm not sure why relocation expenses should be taxed anyway. They are legitimate expenses. You can always cap the tax-free aspect at e.g. one months salary.

[gazzae]

Originally Posted by tweetiepooh

Surely one way to ensure expenses aren't cut by tax is for the payer to gross up the payment, pay the tax to HMRC and the receiver then gets the amount due? OK so the payer looses out (a little but they did force the expense) but the tax man and the receiver both gain.

That was the original plan, but apparently doing that would have affected people claiming tax credits resulting in them being worse off. This is why the company paid the relocation amount in the form of a loan.

Originally Posted by danielf

If they don't like it then put a stop to it. Why this half-arsed approach where something is perfectly legal, and then appeal to people's moral judgement to not take advantage of it? Legislate against it and stop moaning ffs.

It's legal. However it's not an intention of the tax system and is an error that occurs because of an unforeseen circumstance. I think the tax system must be so complicated now that these problems occur.

From HMRC (opens as PDF):

Tax avoidance represents a significant part of the UK tax gap. Unlike evasion, it is not in itself illegal, but it involves using the tax law to get a tax advantage that Parliament never intended. It frequently involves contrived, artificial transactions that serve little or no purpose other than to reduce tax liability.

and, from ITV, what Jimmy Carr was doing:

• UK earners 'quit' their job
• They then sign new employment contracts with offshore shell companies
• The offshore companies 'rehire' their new employee to the UK but take their earnings
• The offshore company pays the employee a much lower salary each month, but 'loans' them several thousand pounds
• These loans can be written down as tax liabilities, thus substantially reducing tax payable to the Government

This is clearly exploiting the tax system to pay as little tax as possible without going to jail.

[denphone]

Originally Posted by Maggy J

I personally think all tax avoidance schemes are morally repugnant except the ones that pay for charity.Off shore,onshore I don't care.Pay the taxes you are supposed to pay.

+1

[danielf]

Originally Posted by Damien

It's legal. However it's not an intention of the tax system and is an error that occurs because of an unforeseen circumstance. I think the tax system must be so complicated now that these problems occur.

From HMRC:



and, from ITV, what Jimmy Carr was doing:



This is clearly exploiting the tax system to pay as little tax as possible without going to jail.

So they should reform the tax system and/or close the loopholes. It simply isn't good enough to go 'yes, we accept that this is legal, but can you please not do it because we don't like it'.

[Alan Fry]

I think the right thing for people like Jimmy Carr should pay all the money back