=Brown targets Switzerland in global tax haven crackdown=Tough controls on offshore regimes as avoidance costs taxpayers billions

• Nicholas Watt, chief political correspondent
• The Guardian, Thursday 19 February 2009

A worldwide crackdown on tax havens, from Switzerland to the Cayman Islands, will be spearheaded by Gordon Brown as the world's richest nations use the global economic downturn to close loopholes that are costing them hundreds of billions in lost revenues.
As he embarks on a mini-tour of EU capitals in advance of the G20 summit in London in April, the prime minister announced yesterday that he was negotiating with fellow world leaders the terms of a tough regulatory system on tax and banking that will cover every country.
Speaking at his monthly press conference in Downing Street, Brown said: "We want the whole of the world to take action. That will mean action against regulatory and tax havens in parts of the world which have escaped the regulatory attention they need. The changes we make will have to apply to all jurisdictions around the world."
The global crackdown envisaged by Brown follows the Guardian's special series, the Tax Gap, which highlighted the ways a range of Britain's biggest companies have employed secretive tax arrangements to reduce their liability. HM Revenue & Customs estimates that the size of the tax gap, which has seen companies shift ownership of brands to offshore tax havens, could be anything between £3.7bn and £13bn.
The prime minister, who will meet the Italian prime minister, Silvio Berlusconi, today in Rome before a mini-summit of the four EU leaders in the G20 in Berlin on Sunday, declined to be drawn on the specifics of his plan. But the Guardian understands that he is taking a particular interest in Switzerland, while Barack Obama singled out the Cayman Islands during the US presidential election campaign.

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Oh FFS. Why does he bother? He's been writing in clauses for ages into every new bit of legislation that lets companies like BP and Barclay's get away with minimal taxation for the last decade, then goes whinging about it.
Added to the thousands of job cuts at the HMRC and he's been shooting himself in the foot over tax avoidance.

...............anything to deviate from his own failures..............

Brown targets Switzerland in tax haven crackdown

No chance - his collegues will soon educate him why every major country has a handy tax haven nearby...

Hypocrisy.... ahh the sound of it.
Wood panelled offices, thick carpets.
Politicos and businessmen, rubbing their hands and signing deeds and trusts.
Winks, maybe a glass or two.
the unavoidable banter - taxes... I'm sick and tired of paying for everyone else... have time for golf next week? I'll call my tax guy and he'll explain all the advantages of Belize domiciliation...


I just can't help it. Tax evasion is really BIG at the top. Companies being handed by their own govt's loopholes so big, a 747 could just fly through.
Moreover - Brown, Tremonti, et al care to comment on the "unique" status of those quaint and fairly exotic places like San Marino, Andorra, Madeira, Montecarlo, Guernsey and Jersey, just to name a few?

Back to Italy - Tremonti ran a firm that was active in trusts, offshore domiciliation, tax efficiency solutions, etc.
But, I forget!
Then was then, bygones are bygones.
Gov't jobs have a way of cleansing a man from his past sins, don't they?



Paul

Doesn't Britain have a few tax havens of it's own?

Certainly does - Gib and the Caymans as a starter for ten. There's one house in the Caymans that's home to a tax evasion lawyer and over 18,000 businesses...

Another uninformed question, might be the wrong thread though...

I read that some us states (Delaware, Vermont??) have special laws regarding banking as well.... can anyone shed light on that?

The British Isles do. Isle of Man and the Channel Islands at least.