The Panama Papers.

Sam asked about a cake;
Cake is a private matter
I’m not aware of cake
I won’t benefit from cake in future
OK I ate the cake

#resigncameron

😆

Either he has suddenly become totally incompetent at PR or there is a little bit more behind this story. On balance, I am siding with the latter as there is not alternative reason why this has been blown up to this extent.

I think you now have to view everything like this through the prism of the EU referendum/Civil war within the Tory party. Dave has never been popular within his own ranks. Now that both sides of the Tory party has declared war on each other, it appears anything is fair game.

We’ve got months of this to come yet. And its going to get dirtier and dirtier. Its not beyond the realms of possibility that the Tory Party may have imploded completely before we get to the 23rd June

It’s funny isn’t it, how when there is a continuous OTT character demolition of Jeremy Corbyn in the newspapers it’s evidence of his poor judgement and he’s brought it all on himself, but when Dave gets some stick for once it’s a ‘non-story’ that’s being unfairly hyped up by the irresponsible media.

It’s funny isn’t it, how when there is a continuous OTT character demolition of Jeremy Corbyn in the newspapers it’s evidence of his poor judgement and he’s brought it all on himself, but when Dave gets some stick for once it’s a ‘non-story’ that’s being unfairly hyped up by the irresponsible media.

You are not alone in your observation!

If you want to really understand US corporate tax avoidance there is a reasonable stab at it in the Economist this week. Here

@grum well its one thing to declare your offshore income and pay tax on it and another to describe the IRA/Hezbolah/Hamas as your friends and the death of OBL as a tragedy

@mefty not so sure Germany would be a net loser tax wise, its pretty unlikely German companies aren’t at it too (plenty of dealings with German co’s wanting to do stuff offshore)!and tax evasion is a national pastime there, ceo Dresdner, Stefi Graf’s “special deal” etc

jambalaya – Member

@grum well its one thing to declare your offshore income and pay tax on it and another to describe the IRA/Hezbolah/Hamas as your friends and the death of OBL as a tragedy

I think that jamba you don’t understand it because he was caught telling porkies

Just like the one you (and Dave used) about Corbs saying bin Laden’s death was a tragedy.

The problem is the more you get caught out bullshitting the less credible you seem

to describe the IRA/Hezbolah/Hamas as your friends and the death of OBL as a tragedy

The first one is arguably poor judgement the second one is a pathetic smear – because what he actually said is that it was a tragedy that he wasn’t put on trial rather than being summarily executed. But of course you knew that.

grum well its one thing to declare your offshore income and pay tax on it

As you well know it’s the part where he didn’t tell the truth about it that he’s getting into trouble for.

Ludicrous double standards and BS on display as usual.

What didn’t he tell the truth about ? What he said was true he hadn’t benefitted from the offshore trust whilst he was pm ? I’ve known he had such a trust from the time he was elected leader

Corbyn did what he did in inviting internationally recognised terrorists (and homophobes) to Westminster thus giving them credibility and publicity, he described them as friends. Anyway one in PM and the other won’t last past Scottish elections (that being my prediction). If Cameron wins the refernedum he’ll stay till 2019, if he loses I think he’ll be gone but when – his chosen candidate is Osbourne but right now he wouldn’t win a contest so some in the party will stall – a quick change means Boris

You’re right, it wasn’t a barefaced lie, like the one you just told about Corbs, Dave’s was being economical with the truth, weasel words, politician speak, a non-denial denial, the sort of thing that people really dislike in a politician

politics of envy thats all this is .. camerons a well meaning bloke doing a job most of us could nt /would nt if i had his money it would be off shore as well.. its not illegal after all

‘Politics of envy’ – thanks, I’m assembling a STW BS-Bingo card and I’d forgotten about that one.

Its not a **** trust

not so sure Germany would be a net loser tax wise, its pretty unlikely German companies aren’t at it too (plenty of dealings with German co’s wanting to do stuff offshore)!and tax evasion is a national pastime there, ceo Dresdner, Stefi Graf’s “special deal” etc

That’s mainly evasion, the simple fact is if you allocate profit out of kilter with the economic reality, companies will just use independent sale companies and would avoid bringing themselves in the tax net at all.

Jamby I think i preferred it when you tried to shoehorn the EU into debates rather than attempted to defend Dave by spreading smears about other folk- the ones that even you know are distorted half truths at best.

Discuss the actual issue without the mud smearing shit throwing side show about Corbyn- it hasd no bearing whatsoever on the fact that Dave provided answer that were both true and misleading at the same time.
Clearly that is Corbyn and the Palestinians fault.

politics of envy thats all this is

Really you think our PM has been linked to offshore tax avoidance, whilst talking tough on tax avoidance and blocking EU attempts to tighten and regulate. You think he has not been obfuscating with his answers and the only reason folk criticise him is the “politic of envy”- TBH you are free to defend him but to claim that is all it is is to show a strikingly poor, I would argue its wilful, lack of understanding and grasp of this issue and perhaps reality. IT’s absurd to suggest that as “all it is”.

camerons a well meaning bloke

Aye we are all in it together What what

Channel four news has unearthed more offshore funds held by daddy C

@JY as a good friend and colleague says “be careful what you ask for” 🙂

@kimbers yes I think he was a bit evasive but I genuinely don’t understand the fuss as this a 8yr (?) old story

@binners Caneron senior was in the offshore funds business, it would make sense he had mkre than one. Cameron junior has already disclosed his income (inc to tax man) and said he won’t benefit from any offshore trusts in the future ?

Ken Livingston PLC on CH4 news now chucking the mud, bit rich that 🙂

@JY as a good friend and colleague says “be careful what you ask for”

I genuinely laughed out loud at that one
Well played.

I agree we all know what his dad did and are not surprised by any of this but he kept it “secret”.

However “the great unwashed” are surprised , annoyed and disappointed. Jamby the issue is that Dave was not open about it in the past or now

I wonder how many know GO is an heir or that he changed his name? I wonder how many know how many of the cabinet are millionaires or that give is Scottish and adopted or that IDS married a millionaire etc.

How many more are lurking out there in secret, in the tropical waters, like a giant great white shark waiting to surface and take down Offshore Dave?

Not sure if any of it adds additional credibility to this aspect, but hey, all good for bumping purposes yo

The Carroll Foundation Trust files are held within a complete lockdown at the FBI Washington DC field office and the Metropolitan Police Scotland Yard London under the supervision of the Commissioner Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe who has an intimate knowledge of this case which stretches the globe.

The BAE, HSBC and Al Yamamah aspects are certainly worth pursuing though, on many levels.

So much of the ‘rich person’ tax avoidance (the kind the papers care about) boils down to ‘living somewhere else’, or ‘having your company somewhere else’.

This is a wrong-headed comment. Firstly, there’s practically bugger all “living somewhere else” going on. Living somewhere else is basically a fair deal: if you don’t want to contribute to society through the medium of taxes, then you should go and live in a society that shares your values. However, practically the opposite occurs: we have a boatload of non-doms who live in this society but are not required to make the same financial contributions the rest of us make.

Second, again, there is nothing wrong with people doing business abroad. Go west, young man – sell fridges to Eskimos or sand to Arabs if you’re good at it. The thing that pisses everyone off is people doing business here and then sending the resulting revenue to spurious companies that do nothing substantive in jurisdictions where the business does nothing, purely for the purpose of dodging tax, avoiding disclosure or laundering the funds.

Yes @kona thats my point but its companies like Apple/Amazon/Google/Facebook who are doing that to the tune of many many billions – it makes the Cameron IHT planning or even Phillip Green/TopShop look absolutely miniscule. Focus on the big stuff, the stuff we can see in plain view

Yes but do we trust Dave to sort it?

Cameron to publish 6 years of tax returns – from when he was PM. Personally I think thats a mistake and a bad precident as its a private matter and in this country we have a problem with financially successful people, we’ll just emd up with even more mediocrity than we have now

This article is oretty balanced, it also notes the substantial difference between Cameron paying full tax on £19k pa income and Jimmy Carr who paid 1% tax on £3.3m pa

Link

More mediocre than Dave?!?!

It is a good link, but iirc Carr backed out so ended up paying full tax?

Either way on the scale of tax avoidance Offshore Daves wasn’t that much, its the double standards that’s the problem and the way it had to be dragged out of him that makes you wonder what else he’s not admitted.

Much more @kimbers – the cabinet and shadow cabinet are the stars below that it gets quite scary and local government is a shocker

@mefty I am only trying to point oit there are many people happy to be based in different locations for all sorts of reasons. I bet you Andy Murray is not tax resident in the UK, why would he chose to be “morals” or not

in this country we have a problem with financially successful people, we’ll just emd up with even more mediocrity than we have now

the real problem is that some of us measure success simply by wealth
Furthermore we have a problem – and lets be honest you keep listing examples so you know this – with wealthy folk/companies who avoid tax. Where we disagree is you blame the EU,attack everyone else from carr to corbyn to been to whomever and only defend Dave.

Looking at Daves his wealth comes from his dad and his wife- none of his jobs really paid that well though he is not poor.

Either way the real issue is the say one thing – talks tough about tax transparency and stamping out tax havens – and doing another – using them, benefitting from them and stopping the EU regulating them. The issue is not really whether he paid tax- thats why he avoiding answering the question initially and prevaricated.

This may be unfair on him but at least get what the problem is as a number of folk have told you now.

Personally I think thats a mistake and a bad precident as its a private matter and in this country we have a problem with financially successful people, we’ll just emd up with even more mediocrity than we have now

Is mediocrity a nurse that has to wipe arses and dress leg sores to keep someone alive, with no access to Panama accounts for their meagre pay?

People of privilage seem to have one rule, whilst everyone else has another. I keep hearing that Cameron has done mothing illegal. Neither has Google. It does not wash with me.

in this country we have a problem with financially successful people,

whatever

So sixteen pages in and lots of accusations made. But have we clarified if there has been any tax avoidance? Mefty provided a link that concluded NO very clearly. But the STW massive has not come up with evidence to suggest that this is wrong….c’mon lets get our acts together, this is serious.

Otherwise we still are in a situation where nothing dodgy happened and yet Dave behaved in a manner the suggests otherwise. Will the Sunday papers tell us more, or will people have to withdraw their accusations?

Problem with financiall successful people? Look around the country today – many thousands of people will willingly gather together spending their hard earned dosh to support a bunch of very financial successfully people who actively engage in “active management” of their financial affairs and play in a sport the is riddled with dodgy dealings – look at its most celebrated star of today. We seem very happy with their success and the means employed to achieve the ends.

So like Dave their seems to be a lot of guilt by association.

I bet you Andy Murray is not tax resident in the UK, why would he chose to be “morals” or not

He is – he lives in Cobham next to a friend of mine.

teamhurtmore – Member

There is no tax avoidance caus football

People of privilage seem to have one rule, whilst everyone else has another. I keep hearing that Cameron has done mothing illegal. Neither has Google. It does not wash with me.

Otherwise we still are in a situation where nothing dodgy happened and yet Dave behaved in a manner the suggests otherwise.

Regardless of the common knowledge that offshore accounts are often used to hide criminal and morally questionable activity, who makes the tax rules in the 1st place?

And how is it that the number of billionaires has increased since the financial crash, yet austerity continues as ‘we’re all in it together’?

@thm – I suggest 16 pages in and it demonstrates that some people are discussing the subject by reducing it to laws and numbers and others are discussing the subject by looking at the bigger picture and how it relates to overall societal values…neither side will ever agree.

@mefty owns a house yes but is he tax resident ? I don’t know for certain but I am making a guess based on the ofher tennis players. I very much doubt he spends more than 90 days in UK so why be tax resident ?

Re above a nurse is doing a very valuable job, my reference was to those in Parliament. Our MPs are paid materially less than those in other countries (Merkel and Hollande are on double money Cameron is ?) we get what we pay for.

There are many ways to judge success but demonising people for having money or being financially successful is a Brttish disease imo

Shared values/tax – so Switzerland doesn’t share our values, or Portugal where you can retire tax free for 10 years, or Luxembourg or Ireland (in the past writers and musicians where largely tax free) or even the US ?

@eden if I may say so I am doing both. The bigger picture is tax avoidance by companies incliding in relation to the internet business models.

Our MPs are paid materially less than those in other countries (Merkel and Hollande are on double money Cameron is ?) we get what we pay for.

🙁