i think you probably know. respect, communist party, socialist party, green.

So many comedians in here. 😆

I couldn’t possibly vote for a party with a clown like George Galloway in it. The missing word is ‘credible’.

And, my god, this country is desperate for a credible alternative.

In South America this emerged as their economies were subjected to the extreme Chicago School blitzkrieg that we’re presently embarked on at the moment, in the 70’s and 80’s, so I live in hope….

I couldn’t possibly vote for a party with a clown like George Galloway in it

well if you care more about the ‘personalities’ of a party than the policies even when the policies actually offer the solutions that you seek then it’s hard to take your point of view seriously.

and that doesn’t explain why you wouldn’t vote socialist, communist or green.

you talk the talk but don’t want to walk the walk. that’s why left wing parties remain without credibility – because people who should vote for them don’t vote for them.

So many comedians in here

hilarious

it is difficult to vote for , as opposed to voting against under the electoral shistym we have.

The thing is a sham anyhow, its a choice of flavoured turds…

and that doesn’t explain why you wouldn’t vote socialist, communist or green.

Because it would be completely pointless under our current electoral system?

Because it would be completely pointless under our current electoral system?

+1

Also, as I recall, last general election my choices in my constituency were UKIP, Conservative, Labour and Lib Dem. 🙁

Its not a case of voting for personalities. I wouldn’t trust a party with George Galloway as its figurehead to run a bath! Never mind the countries economy!

We desperately need a credible alternative to the two party is-it-our-turn-now system, as they’re all in hock to the same people. Namely the bankers and corporations who’ve created and are now ruthlessly exploiting the present financial shit-storm. But the idea that Respect is the answer is laughable!

I heard Hodge on at the Amazon chap about how much tax they’ve paid in the UK, and he evaded it a couple of times. Quite frankly he should have just commented on how its a bit of a surprise how one part of the Govt doesn’t know how much has been paid to another part…

Its all pointless, unless someone changes the rules. Say, if the Govt made it illegal to spend taxpayers monies with corporations/businesses that it had decided were operating against the national interest. That’d be a start.

Going back to someone’s point about why a small business would prefer cash to a cheque: It actually costs MORE to pay in cash into a business account than a cheque; if you don’t pay cash in, you have no record of having lodged a payment. The only reason for accepting cash in my business (building industry) is that you intend to avoid paying tax on it!
Really, any thread about tax avoidance that features Zulu-Eleven is always going to feel empty without The North Edinburgh Gentleman with a Bicycle made for Two!!

Remind me when Hodge is going to have her daddy’s company in front of this committee to explain their tax affairs.

Blimey, maybe our resident conspiracy theorist was correct in his assessment of the BBC. So 10 O’clock news reports these hearings with a comparison between turnover (sales) and tax payments……hmmm,….dramatic effect/journalistic distortion or just stupidity, I wonder?!? Another piece of poor journalism. Looks like Auntie really is on a bad roll.

You would have though that Hodge would have had the dignity and respect for the GB public to resign from being the face of this panel. Her faux outrage was sickening and hypocritical.

I thought the body language of the smirking, sneering execs of the various corporations in those hearings was pretty telling. Like a school bully whose dad is on the board of governors getting called in for a token ticking-off from an impotent headmaster.

Sadly that was true. Was that Austim Mitchell dressed up in panto kit (1980s fancy dress braces)? Hardly going to send any of those guys into panic attacks with such lightweight questioning. What s the point of these hearings when staffed by lightweights and those in the line of are able to dismiss the whole thing with contempt.

I do not expect that many people will be replacing google as their preferred search engine in the morning.

I do not expect that many people will be replacing google as their preferred search engine in the morning.

That’s it, I’m changing to Bing in the morning. That’ll teach ’em. The revolt against powerful multinationals usurping the nation state starts HERE! 👿

What s the point of these hearings when staffed by lightweights

Good question, its not like there’s a shortage of experienced QC’s in either house of Parliament…

EThics has got very little to do with it and any argument that states a company should voluntarily be paying more tax than it nee to is naive in the extreme

Th eproblem is tha th e locally owned cafe next door has to pay mor etax than them and cannot compete with them.
Not only this but they are also paying a fa rhigher rate of tax despite not being a multibillion pound enterprise

We cannot expect them to have morality that is why we need to legislate to make sur ethey do.

No one would pay for petrol/food if you could just drive/walk off but that would not make it correct or something we should attempt to defend.
They are robbing from us all by not paying their taxes as someone has to pay for the defecit and it is you and I or the little people and not the rich people

TBH what we need is customers to boycott. I dont drink coffee, I dont use amazon and now I have stopped using Google

Remind me when Hodge is going to have her daddy’s company in front of this committee to explain their tax affairs.

Indeed.

Michael Meacher tried to introduce a private members bill this year to try and curtail this kind of tax avoidence

Today I am introducing a Private Member’s Bill into the Commons (having won a place in the Private Members’ Bill lottery) which will outlaw any financial transaction for which the primary purpose is tax avoidance/evasion rather than any genuine economic purpose. It will transfer the burden of proof, from HMRC having to prove that a transaction was really a disguised tax avoidance device, to a company having to prove that it had a genuine purpose. If HMRC believed for good reasons that it was really for tax avoidance purposes, they could declare that the transaction was null and void and it would be for the company, if they so chose, to challenge that decision in court.

How much support did it get from a government supposedly committed to challenging tax avoidance. None! But then what else would we expect from a cabinet stuffed with the beneficiaries of various tax avoidance scams

Interesting point Binners but you may want to extend your concluding sentence to include the wider political system as the various references to Hodge and others suggest. I think the UK and Germany are pushing for greater harmonisation of tax across Europe but doubt that low tax countries will be rushing to follow suit. Until that happens I fear that Meachers proposals would be in vain.

thm – Agreed. Its too easy for companies to rent themselves a PO Box in Dublin or Luxemburg, and say that your headquarters are now there, so thats where they’ll pay tax

And politically – yeah, labour are no better. I wonder if Blair has been employing any ‘creative accounting’ on his obscenely large earnings? As if we even need to ask? So not too hard to see why they did the grand total of absolutely sod all about tax avoidance while in power

leaving the little people to both pay the bill and makes these companies so wealthy

Dont buy their wares – its not hard to counter without legislation

Their business model is to make money of they cannot they will alter what they do as they dont actually want to make a real world loss only a pretend world one.

They are all as bad as each other. Scared to take them on as if Amazon or apple or starbuck would stop trading here if they were taxed properly

It also gives a huge disdvantage to small local companies [ who are closing] as they actually pay tax here – shops, book shops, cafes etc

JY, isn’t this where we need better analysis. What exactly are the benefits of these companies versus their costs? Equally, how much does the small local shop actually contribute beyond the Meg Ryan imagery?* Jambalya alluded to the fact that by paying only min wages that Starbucks is a net cost to the economy despite their arguments yesterday and before about actual contributions etc (eg NI). It would be interesting to see more in this hence my frustration with Bbc etc relying on superficialities and distortions rather than digging deep.

* a couple of years ago a traditional bookshop in my local town launched a petition against the opening of an Ottakers (if I remember correctly as it is now Waterstones). My initial willingness to sign up was replaced by the realisation that the bookshop was a dinosaur where books were rarely in stock. “We can order it in in about a week” versus Amazon “we will deliver to you in 48 hours.” Ok, these small companies are placed at massive competitive disadvantages by things such as tax distortions but they still need to recognise that businesses have to earn the right to compete. Politicians should focus on providing them a level playing field on which to do so IMO.

JY, isn’t this where we need better analysis. What exactly are the benefits of these companies versus their costs? Equally, how much does the small local shop actually contribute beyond the Meg Ryan imagery?*

Whatever it is they dont send it all abroad and pretend to make a loss so I think we can safely assume more without the detailed analysis you seem to need befor emaking any judgement 😉 I get your point [ its a fair one]as i am sure you get mine.

Jambalya alluded to the fact that by paying only min wages that Starbucks is a net cost to the economy despite their arguments yesterday and before about actual contributions etc (eg NI). It would be interesting to see more in this hence my frustration with Bbc etc relying on superficialities and distortions rather than digging deep.

Probably scared to dig deep after what happened this week

Ok, these small companies are placed at massive competitive disadvantages by things such as tax distortions but they still need to recognise that businesses have to earn the right to compete.

Depends though all businesses need money and they cannot have the stock levels of Amazon [ perhaps they could if they were exempt from tax??] but o fyiou want high street bookstores [ like LBS] you have to accept they will be more costly than the Internet

Politicians should focus on providing them a level playing field on which to do so IMO

True but not sure how they can tbh hence why I would empower consumers to make them act responsibly or withdraw their custome. after all what the comapanies notice in the main is the bottom line

Are there any market forces that stop companies growing and growing until they own 99% of the market?

Perhaps we’ll just end of living in a world of Starbucks, Tescos, Amazon, Google, eBay and McDonalds with everyone else unable to compete.

People area always complaining about Tescos but still seem to shop there, i’m not convinced that Moral Outrage is sufficient to overcome convenience and cheaper prices.

JY as I am stuck with the Novovirus feeling sorry for myself, I have some time to dig around. There is some interesting debates with the likes of Tax Justice Network, The Oxford Cente for Business Taxation and the FT among other on his issue. Struggling to copy links from iPad but google (sorry!!!) some of the names and links. Prof Michael devereaux in FT on Oct 22 is worth a read as it it sensibly balanced and very short.

Indeed consumers have the ultimate sanction, but look what they do with it!!!!

FWIW, I am prepared to support local stores and pay a higher price (eg my LBS) if they provide a service and do not hide behind a business model that says ordering a book in for next week is a sustainable business model. Even Meg Ryan went beyond that 😉

People area always complaining about Tescos but still seem to shop there, i’m not convinced that Moral Outrage is sufficient to overcome convenience and cheaper prices.

thing is they are not cheaper for many things, its the convenience bull that people fall for. Town i live has NO greengrocers any more– got seven ‘super’ markets– all selling the same type of stuff,all in plastic bags !

The french seem to have resisted this crap, by legislation and more direct methods …

Cheers THM I will do my own googling and get well soon

Still think it is not fair on the local companies [never mind my rabbid lefty tax the hell out of them tendencies] as it gives them an unfair advantage

Aye consumers just want it cheaper and nothing else saddly

We do ok locally but only because we have amarket that attracts outsiders so the town centre can still “thrive” by thrive i mean independently owned quid shops, one hardware shop and a few cafes, a florist- still better than most high streets but still a tiny minority of the overall shops

JY, isn’t this where we need better analysis. What exactly are the benefits of these companies versus their costs? Equally, how much does the small local shop actually contribute beyond the Meg Ryan imagery?*

Local businesses employ more people (per given amount of revenue or whatever), and the profits stay local to a much greater extent (and they pay normal business taxes).

All true, but I don’t recall there being anywhere near as many small, independent coffee shops around before Starbucks/Costa “created” the demand.

All true, but I don’t recall there being anywhere near as many small, independent coffee shops around before Starbucks/Costa “created” the demand.

Used to be lots of cafes, fish and chip shops, local bakery’s etc, all starbucks et al, have done is created an image, not a new demand.

True that there has always been pretentious **** willing to pay a lot for nats piss remember designer lagers 😉

There is one in my home town[independent now iirc] but as I dont drink coffee they are not something that I notice tbh

they are much more profitable than pubs, less hassle and cheap to set up.

Going to try one sometime, just need to be in the right mood 😉

Mibbe it’s a metropolitan thing but I used to notice this when I was into motorcycling. We’d go out for a spin somewhere, want to stop to eat/drink and the preponderance of options were pubs who weren’t really into selling hot drinks.

I’m not sure southern pretentious coffee shops are a new thing. Anyone remenber Hancocks Half Hour? Theres a great episode called “The Espresso bar” from the 60’s …

http://www.last.fm/music/Tony+Hancock/_/Hancock%27s+Half+Hour+-+S04+-+E10+-+The+Espresso+Bar

All true, but I don’t recall there being anywhere near as many small, independent coffee shops around before Starbucks/Costa “created” the demand.

I worked in an independent cafe in a small market town at least 15 years ago that served filter coffee and cappucinos, mochas and lattes. Pretty sure that’s before Starbucks etc existed in this country.

There’s been Italian cafes in Morecambe selling espressos etc for at least 50 years.

MM italian cafes with super sized cakes – decor and staff unchanged in the last 50 years

grum – Member
Local businesses employ more people (per given amount of revenue or whatever), and the profits stay local to a much greater extent (and they pay normal business taxes)

Interesting justification Grum – pls can I quote it elsewhere?

There have always been quality cafe’s serving proper coffee – but not the preponderance of them on every high street.

There’s little doubt that starbucks have very much ‘created’ a market -ok, you could probably blame TV programmes for it a bit as well, but you only need to remember what supermarket cafe’s were like a few years ago (or pop into your local morrisons to be reminded :wink:) compared with your local Sainsburys with a starbucks in it.

go if back to the early nineties, the concept of spending three quid plus on a coffee would have you spluttering in disbelief.

Personally, as you know, I love the free market – so, I choose where to spend my money, and Starbucks don’t get a penny!

grum – Member
Local businesses employ more people (per given amount of revenue or whatever), and the profits stay local to a much greater extent (and they pay normal business taxes)

Used to be lots of cafes, fish and chip shops, local bakery’s etc, all starbucks et al, have done is created an image, not a new demand.

When I was a student there was ooh, three sit-down cafes with comfy seats in Cardiff, places you might want to actually spend time. Their coffee was awful.

Now there are about 5 Starbucks, several Costa a couple of Nero, a Coffee #1 and sundry others. They’re all rammed most of the time. So I’d say yes, demand has been created.

The thing is, Starbucks sells stuff that you could never get before they came to town. Coffee snobs might not like the espresso, but the kids sure as hell like the chocolate chip frappucinos.