Britain is to host the G8 later this month. There is much talk of Tax being high on the agenda.
David Cameron's call to tackle tax avoidance
"...The Prime Minister wrote to leaders in countries including Bermuda, the British Virgin Islands, the Cayman Islands and Gibraltar to call for more transparency over tax and the ownership of companies. He wrote: "I respect your right to be lower tax jurisdictions. I believe passionately in lower taxes as a vital driver of growth and prosperity for all.
''But lower taxes are only sustainable if what is owed is actually paid - and if the rules to achieve this are set and enforced fairly to create a level playing field right across the world. There is no point in dealing with tax evasion in one country if the problem is simply displaced to another.'' ..."
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/david-cameron/10067378/David-Camerons-call-to-tackle-tax-avoidance.html
David Cameron talking tough on tax as G8 nears - but what can he deliver?
"...There is also world-weariness about such crackdowns. World leaders have vowed action for generations. President Kennedy made such a promise in 1961. More recently, in the wake of the UBS tax haven scandals of 2008, where bankers smuggled toothpaste tubes full of diamonds across borders, Gordon Brown and Nicholas Sarkozy also promised they were identifying and blacklisting secretive tax havens, yet little seemed to change.
But the worm seems to have turned, not just in the UK, but across the west. Pressure on domestic budgets, anger with the banks for the 2007 crash, compounded by their role in facilitating successive tax avoidance scandals, the involvement of some of the biggest brands, such as Google, Amazon and Apple, has combined to make this an unavoidable moment in the UK, the US and Europe. Suddenly chartered accountancy finds itself thrust onto the frontline of the battle for equality...."
"...That leaves the question of what specifically Cameron can deliver at the G8 in June. He can of course first clear up Britain's own backyard of tax havens. Action Aid this month estimated the UK is currently responsible for one-in-five of tax havens globally - more than any other country.
Cameron has already announced that "all of the Overseas Territories with significant financial centres have signed up to a pilot tax information sharing agreement". Osborne described this as a turning point in the fight against tax evasion and illicit finance, even if detail is sketchy.
Cameron has also asked them to sign up to the OECD's Multilateral Convention on Mutual Assistance in Tax Matters before the G8 meeting. Last week at an OECD ceremony involving nine countries, only Belize of the British tax havens added its name to the convention on tax information sharing. Cameron hopes they will sign on the eve of the G8.
Cameron has also urged them to publish action plans on beneficial ownership. These would provide for fully resourced and properly managed centralised registries, that are freely available to law enforcement and tax collectors, and contain full and accurate details on the true ownership and control of every company...."
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jun/04/david-cameron-tax-crackdown-g8?INTCMP=SRCH
If, "Clarity begins at home." pressing the UK's overseas dependency Tax Havens is not as close to home as we are led to believe...
Eye read...
"...It was no surprise last year when researchers from Australia's Griffiths University posing as businessmen found it three times easier... ...to get company formation agents in the UK to set up untraceable shell companies than it was to persuade those in Tax Havens to do so..."