Coalition to Launch TAX Evasion Clampdown

[hitch_1980]

Just seen this on the BBC website

 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-11359306

 

I think it will be one of these things where we wait and see, to see if it happens

[Loubbe]

Well, if it does happen, it's about time. Reading the national press, it would appear that the greatest scourge of our society are those who claim (or falsely claim) benefits, and the tax-dodger has nary a mention. £7bn is an astounding amount of money, especially considering there can't be THAT many people wealthy enough to take avantage of offshore tax havens, non dom status etc etc. Compared to the estimated £1bn of benefit fraud that the government seems so keen to crack down on, this is a far greater problem.

[milquetoast1]

From the BBC article, "Just like the benefit cheat, they take resources from those who need them most. Tax avoidance and evasion are unacceptable in the best of times but in today's circumstances it is morally indefensible. We will be ruthless with those often wealthy people and businesses who think they can treat paying tax as an optional extra."

 

So Chief Secretary to the Treasury Danny Alexander says that both legal tax avoidance (trying to minimise your tax bill by using the rules set up by the State) and illegal tax evasion (not declaring earnings) are BOTH "unacceptable and morally indefensible."

 

Would that be the same Danny Alexander that switched his second home allowance while an MP to avoid paying CGT on its sale?

 

What's that word beginning with "h" and ending in "ypocrite" that I'm thinking of here?

[Mecky]

I'll believe this when I see it and who is going to do the clamping down since there will be few Civil Servants left to process the work?

[andyrad29]

its nice to know they can rustle up another £70million to send to Pakistan tho aint it?

[Agent Orange]

I'd like to see how an over stretched civil service, after any job cuts, will implement this.

[dell12]

its nice to know they can rustle up another £70million to send to Pakistan tho aint it?

 

I'd rather that than the money sitting in a Switzerland bank vault.

[Greybeard]

I'd like to see how an over stretched civil service, after any job cuts, will implement this.

 

Apparently the govt. are to spend £900million on the scheme using private sector contractors. Lie detectors will be employed when contacting possible culprits by telephone.

 

The £900 million will be found from the savings made on benefit cuts

[Agent Orange]

Apparently the govt. are to spend £900million on the scheme using private sector contractors. Lie detectors will be employed when contacting possible culprits by telephone.

 

The £900 million will be found from the savings made on benefit cuts

 

Oh great... Jeremy Kyle and his team will be employed to implement this scheme

[Funky_Gibbon]

Their proposed clampdown will garner a total of £7billion in four years so £1.75billion a year. HMRC estimate that there is £30billion a year in tax that isn't being paid (others estimate upto 4 times that) so this proposed clampdown is little more than a figleaf for the coming spending cuts. And that's if it makes it past Osborne.