Tax avoidance is harming us all.

[Staunton]

A couple of years ago there were a number of threads on this forum asking what the protests were all about outside Boots, Vodafone, Barclays and other retail and banking outlets in the city centre. As was stated at the time, they were drawing attention to corporate tax avoidance.

 

Few people could claim to be unaware of this scandal today. Tax avoidance has been headline news on the front pages of the mainstream broadsheets and tabloids over the last few months, whilst scandals at Starbucks, RBS and Barclays have received widespread television coverage. However, as the Observer revealed on Sunday, the scandals continue to surface. Thanks to Action Aid, as The Observer reports, we learn that Associated British Foods, owners of brands such as Silver Spoon sugar, Twinings tea and Kingsmill bread, have been avoiding a staggering amount of tax, impoverishing a whole region of Africa and simultaneously failing to contribute to UK revenue in these bleak economic times.

 

Meanwhile, Burger King, Findus, etc have been caught taking advantage of deregulated markets globally in order to source food at the lowest prices possible. Purchasing cheap meat from Poland and Romania via complex strategies involving the channeling of products via Ireland, Cyprus, Luxembourg and the Netherlands is just bound to be bad for us all, even if it is good for profit margins in the corporate sector.

 

Tax avoidance, deregulation and free-market practices are harming us all.

 

Please take notice of what is happening. As local authorities are outsourcing their essential services to tax avoiding multinationals and cutting vital services here in the North, the tory led coalition continues to promote tax cuts for big business and wealthy individuals. Meanwhile, we ordinary folk lose our jobs, our incomes, our rights and our support services.

 

Attacking the public sector, privatising essential services, cutting jobs, deregulation and tax avoidance harm us all, each and every one of us!

 

Do you want a town filled with pay day loan companies, betting shops, charity collectors, and empty retail units? The economy should work for us all, not for the profit of the few.

[ricgem2002]

your wasting your breath mate the 2bob millionaires on here think its the way forward

[RazorSHarp]

So what's the solution?

[Penistone999]

Will we be seeing the return of Camp Casper outside the Cathedral to protest against those horrible, nasty multi National Companies ? You know , those horrible ,nasty companies who employ hundreds of thousands of people in this country ?

[ricgem2002]

Will we be seeing the return of Camp Casper outside the Cathedral to protest against those horrible, nasty multi National Companies ? You know , those horrible ,nasty companies who employ hundreds of thousands of people in this country ?

heres one now :hihi:

[geared]

Until both our government and the EU do something about it there's not much thats going to change.

 

and since it's not in the politicians best wishes then it's not going to happen anytime soon.

[Mr Bloom]

Will we be seeing the return of Camp Casper outside the Cathedral to protest against those horrible, nasty multi National Companies ? You know , those horrible ,nasty companies who employ hundreds of thousands of people in this country ?

 

Substitute 'employ' with 'exploit' and your post would reveal more truth.

[Penistone999]

Substitute 'employ' with 'exploit' and your post would reveal more truth.

 

These companies adhere to the law of this country and pay the minimum wage ,so where are people exploited . ?

[gnvqsos]

These companies adhere to the law of this country and pay the minimum wage ,so where are people exploited . ?

 

You clearly cannot separate what is right morally from what is legally correct.As you know some landlords exploit tenants by raising their rent and not carrying out repairs,yet remain inside the law.

[mikem8634]

These companies adhere to the law of this country and pay the minimum wage ,so where are people exploited . ?

 

The irony of the large benefits bill is that, far from featherbedding the feckless poor, housing benefit goes straight into the pockets of landlords, while tax credits enable employers to pay below a living wage and thus subsidise their profits.

Dr Jamie Gough

Co-author, Spaces of Social Exclusion, University of Sheffield

 

I think it is fair to say that big business relies upon exploiting the taxpayer as much as landlords do.