Thanks for cropping that there, really helpful. I am making the point that to send assets out of the UK tax system, you often have to pay an “exit charge” based on the value of the asset when it is moved.

So say I had a patent owned by a UK company and it’s worth £0.5m and I want to transfer it to Luxembourg, I will probably pay tax on at least part of the £0.5m when it leaves the UK. I will then pay Luxembourg tax instead of UK tax on the income it generates.

So it’s not a massive tax-saving scam – it’s an up-front cost in the UK for lower tax in future.

And there are risks in doing this – for example the UK rate might come down (as it is doing – heading for 23%) and the special Lux rate could well go up or be abolished, so overall it is a possibility I could end up worse off.

Re Guardian – if a company had owned 49.9% of Autotrader it wouldn’t have been taxable (as companies selling subsidiaries/ joint ventures generally don’t pay tax on the gain, nor do they get tax relief if they sell at a loss). My guess would be that GMG owned Autotrader via something that wasn’t a company, and did something to get the same treatment on the sale of their interest in Autotrader that a company would normally get. Trust law is similar to company law in that the trustees have a statutory duty to protect the assets of the trust, and paying more tax than necessary won’t cover that. And consider who wrote trust law – yes, it’s back to the Government.

I do like the suggestion that a company can just send it’s income offshore at will – simple fact is, it can’t be done at the drop of a hat. The UK has reasonably “high walls” around its tax system so income earned here will pretty much definitely taxable here. There are all sorts of laws that stop you blatantly declaring income earned in the UK abroad.

For a start there are international rules on transfer pricing (the prices companies pay each other for goods and services) that ensure companies in the same group pay third party prices for things (so subsidiary one can’t sell subsidiary two something on the cheap to move profits around).

There are also rules on “controlled foreign companies” that mean a UK company with subsidiaries outside the UK has to demonstrate they have a real business there – if it can’t, the company’s profits are deemed to have been paid up to the UK parent and taxed at a punitive rate.

That said, it’s not perfect and some things are easier to do than others (or more worthwhile). For example transferring intellectual property (patents and copyright for example) to Luxembourg where income from such income is taxable at a low rate. By paying the Lux company a royalty for use of its IP (so you have a tax deductible expense in the UK and income taxable at a lower rate in Luxembourg) you move profits and save tax. BUT you might well find you have to pay some tax upfront on the value of the IP when it leaves the UK, which will conveniently not be mentioned by critics.

Most of the companies that have gone offshore in recent years (WPP and Shires for example) are UK headquartered, but only have a small part of their business in the UK. It simply doesn’t make sense for a predominantly UK company to move its tax residence offshore as it will still pay a lot of UK tax.

Corporation tax is only a very small part of the overall tax take anyway; 8% in 2008 for example** – and a lot of that was from banks and other Financial Sector companies, which won’t be paying much tax at the moment.

Corporation tax is necessarily very complex, and so you can get unintended results (both favourable and unfavourable). Tax planning covers a whole spectrum from doing things that defer paying tax for a while, to arranging affairs in an efficient manner than ensures the tax result reflects the commercial reality of a transaction (which it won’t necessarily do even for relatively simple things that “should” work), through doing a transaction a bit differently to get a favourable outcome, to the point where you are arguably only doing a transaction because it gives you a good tax result (maybe exploiting the “cracks” between two sets of tax rules, either in the UK Tax system or between jurisdictions, or setting something up so it gives an asymmetrical tax treatment of a payment from one company to another). Shades of grey, certainly.

(EDIT – the difference between tax avoidance and evasion is that avoidance is legal, and involves full disclosure of what has been done and the basis in law for the treatment adopted.

Tax evasion is illegal and involves elements of concealment or deceit. No FTSE company should be doing anything close to evasion.)

Pretty much every time someone buys a CD, DVD or memory card online from the likes of Amazon they are complicit in corporate tax avoidance. A lot of companies (according to Wikipedia, Amazon, HMV online and Play.com ) base these sales in the Channel Islands so effectively sell things without paying VAT. Consumer wins, due to lower price (remember VAT is now 20%) but government doesn’t get their VAT. It’s a double whammy for government as the profits of the company set up in, say, Guernsey, won’t pay UK tax either as its operation is offshore. Kaboom.

**(see page 5 of http://www.ifs.org.uk/bns/bn09.pdf )

I’ve never had a problem with a wheel from Bicycleworks on Argyle Place (well, not one that has been anyone’s other than my own fault!).

Still works :-)

Cheers Harry!

Yep – Shiel 7 would go better than 5 Sisters I’d think. The track at the east end is an old road (now submerged under Loch Loyne) so will give you easy height gain at that end. There’s a fairly decent stalker’s path from the Bealach Duibh Leac heading back into Glenshiel; from what I remember it disappears into the heather lower down though we did come off the hill in proper darkness so could just have lost it (sunset from the ridge was lovely though).

Ben Wyvis – would definitely go, good path from the Ullapool road side. The top is sort of mossy/ peaty on rock, quite odd, one for high summer.

Beinn Dearg above Blair Atholl – yes. Absolutely. If memory serves me well you’d get a long way up and all the way down by bike.

Mount Keen (probably the most obvious one) – yes, either end. Classic route with the Fungle as a return.

Five sisters of Kintail – a lot of steep heatherbashing to get up (either from Gleann Lichd or the A87 side, assuming you’re starting from the east end) then the ridge is proper steep. It’s a serious proposition with a lot of carrying up, and there was no clear path onto or off the ridge when I did it.

Up that way, Ben Fhada from Loch Sheil side via the bealach on the north side would almost certainly be worth the effort as an out-and-back. A strong rider could probably ride most of the ascent and it would be a ripper of a down.

Be prepared for a fight. In 2003 I bought a Sugar+ – it never worked properly.

The Manitou forks were coil sprung but you couldn’t get a heavier spring (despite the shop assuring me they had one “on order” – in the end I got one from a Manitou service truck at one of the 24 hour races.)

The Cane Creek rear shock lost air and packed down – but the rebound wasn’t adjustable. Ended up replacing that with a Fox one as apparently it was “normal” and the shop couldn’t find anything wrong with it as it was (though it was clearly fecked).

Then the bizarre “top hat bushing” set-up on the main pivot started to wear – again that was normal to get 6 months out the bushings. Shop replaced them a couple of times (I had to pay for them but they didn’t charge me for fititng – how kind!). The third set lasted a matter of weeks. Turned out the frame was out of alignment and the surfaces on the front end on which the top hats sat were worn asymmetrically. Great. So Trek said they would replace that for me. Took weeks and weeks.

Finally got a call saying it was sorted and I could collect my bike – Imagine my surprise and delight when I went to collect the bike and found they had only replaced the front triangle! Yes – it was blindingly obvious because the front end was “team” colours – blue, yellow and red IIRC – and the back end was dark blue.

So ultimately it took a threat of legal action from trading standards to get that sorted – the back end got resprayed to match the front.

Even after best part of ten years I am STILL bitter, and would never buy a Trek. So unless things have changed, good luck but don’t hold your breath for fear of expirting.

A file/ Stanley knife to the paint should sort that, it’s a bit annoying but has needed to be done to a couple of frames I’ve built up.

There’s an option somewhere in iTunes to put tracks on your iPod/ iPhone at 128kbps regardless of file resolution.

Took too long on my shonky computer but if you have a fast PC could work?

If you go to “driving directions”, and move the existing point onto Gardiner’s Crescent it gives you a legal route that is pretty sensible on a bike (though at the moment you’d have to walk the bike to Grosvenor Street due to roadworks at Haymarket junction).

Their suggested route from Haymarket Station to the meeting point (linked from here) takes you the wrong way up three one way streets (Morrison Street, Grove Street and Leamington Road). Then it takes you onto one of the “No Cycling” paths on Bruntsfield Links.

Not exactly “best practice”, that…

I guess these ain’t as popular as they were back in’t day…

Holy cow! That ain’t going to be sorted with a few gabions.

One of my routes goes (or went) over a shonky old cart bridge over a steep-sided wee ravine. Wednesday night it was there, Saturday morning it wasn’t. I’d have definitely gone off the edge if I’d hit it on a night ride, stopped about a foot from the edge as it was. Eeeek.

druidh – that path is part of the “original” path network at Glentress; I know some of it overlaps with the Tower walk, but as I have been riding it for longer than the Tower walk has been waymarked I continue to ride it (though tend to leave the non-waymarked stuff over winter).

It’s also been used for Duathlons (maybe not for bike) and MTB races in recent times.

* wonders if he’ll make it worse by identifying it….*

Only if you tell the STW massive that it is insanely RADICAL.

Which bit is that druidh?

I think a point worth making is that the bike trails are purpose-built for mountainbiking and a recent addition to the forest; and generally walkers stay away from them.

Similarly there are recent walking trails that I hope/ believe bikers generally stay away from.

The crossover is that some bits now waymarked as walking routes have been there as long as I have been going to Glentress and overlap with oldskool biking routes in a few places. Remember also that a fair few sections of the Black are actually a shared use trail, as bike route sits where established paths were.

I think I have only seen a few people on foot on a bike trail in all the times I was at Glentress (though one was a man pushing a pushchair up the bottom of Falla Brae), and I have never seen anyone on foot where an old route crosses/ shares with a walking route.

Swung by tonight – you can get under the railway bridge at Russell Road (from Roseburn to Gorgie).

No access from Russell Road to the Cycle route – the bank is all dug away and the workies have a sort of ladder/ staircase thing to get up and down.

Quietest route is probably Tollcross – Fountainbridge – Telfer Subway – Russell Road.

I _think_ you can get under the railway bridge on Russell Road by bike or foot; no idea about access to the Roseburn cycle path from Russell Road or Haymarket Yards.

Well Haymarket junction is globally fecked as of yesterday until “Spring 2012”. But almost impossible to avoid. Aaaaargh.

Really, these trams will have to be AMAZING for all this to be worthwhile.

Missoni on Royal Mile/ George IV Bridge is meant to be good and regularly has offers on.

Also George Hotel on George Street (often the city centre “4* mystery hotel” on Last Minute.com

Avoid anything Travelodge/ PremierInn at the weekend, will be full of stag and hen dos.

Anyone???

This thread will be closed by lunchtime, I reckon.

Transition lenses were 130 quid!!!!!! Went for Persimmon, should do the job.

Anything and everything on road bike. What I’m going to have for dinner, how much my legs hurt, “oh look at the pretty clouds”. Quite often solve work problems as well (I do quite a technical/ problem solving kind of job so good to have a bit of reflection time – though idea of the year so far came to me when gardening!).

Mountain bike tends to be a bit more focussed on the job in hand.

Well you can’t get a case discount on wine any more, and “buy 2 save £10” on malts, so it will change things for me.

If you’re going at antisocial behaviour then I think minimum pricing would make a difference. I’m thinking things like £9 vodka and whisky, cheap superstrength lager and £4 bottles of 3l cider all of which were readily available here (or were yesterday). And probably a ban on caffienated alcoholic drinks. And maybe even ban offsales to under 21s after 5pm or something.

26 vs 29 doesn’t make any difference IME. I run 180s on my Soul (26) and Scandal 29er cos I am a bit fat.

I’m no physicist but I’d be surprised if a slightly heavier, larger radius wheel makes any perceptible difference when slowing 100kg of bike and rider.

Had a couple of email exchange this week on some tyres (taken off a new bike unridden).

“On-one have them for the same price you’re selling them”
So obviously I had a look, and they were neither at the same price nor in stock. Pointed this out politely and one guy was fine with it – apparently Google is showing them at 19.99 so fair enough.

Another was “well you need to drop your price or I won’t buy them”
Me “why?”
Him “because I could get them from on-one”
Me “they aren’t in stock, and more likely than not won’t ever be at that price again”
Him “well I could have got them last week at that price”
Me “well go and do that”
Him – no response.

Princess Street (fortunately) doesn’t directly affect my run in.

Getting through Haymarket from Morrison Street and Haymarket Terrace is effed up to the maxx though – or was last time I did it at the end of last week. Fine if you need to do some lane closures, but generally it’s best if you close the same lane before and after a busy junction so people have a clue where they should be going.

I’ve stopped wondering if the cooncil is on crack – I now want to know what sort of crack they are on.

Still, I got the bus yesterday and apart from probably catching bus AIDS six times over, it cost £2.80 return and took nearly twice as long as riding. So could be worse…

I have no idea what your point is, caller.

Edukator – should have qualified that last para with the “at 10-12 quid mark”. There are bargains out there but there is a lot of mediocre wine as well. I have never tasted cru classe Bordeaux, but don’t doubt it is amazing stuff. It is also far beyond my price range.

I doubt the best Chilean wines are even mid-ranking overall, but £30ish will get you (for example) a single vineyard wine from a top producer (who often have input from Old World winemakers), and more and more it is about terrior which the French excel at. Having tasted 3 very different white Burgundies made from distinct parcels on the same hillside in the same year, it is clear to me that it matters.

Anyway the OP’s mate seems to be happy – if the Lebanese stuff was Chateau Musar probably a good call to avoid, it is a bit of a powerful one and may not be to everyone’s taste – and that’s the main thing.

And I’m looking at a half case of Bordeaux as I type this hoping something in there will convince me…

Edukator- bit late coming back to this but I think you deserve an answer.

I suspect you are implying that great wine is as much subjective as objective. We’ve just had a very pleasing 2001 Gigondas – I loved it but can see it is a good (but not great) wine.

Hopefully a £30 bottle in the UK will be technically very good even if it is not to everyone’s taste. And someone who “likes their wine” will get more out a £30 bottle that isn’t exactly to their taste than a tenner bottle that is. For example I’m deeply sceptical about mid-range Bordeaux (maybe £30 a bottle), but if you give me a very good Rhone then I will almost always love it – and if it doesn’t say “Hermitage”, “Cote Rotie” or “Chateauneuf du Pape” for that sort of money it will be very good.

Similarly I will state categorically I’ve never spent a tenner on a red Burgundy or Bordeaux and be happy (acid PN and medicore CS or Merlot).,

I will be delighted with (for example) Sainsbury’s Taste The Difference Cotes du Rhone Villages at about 7-8 quid. Unfashionable areas rule for me. I am trying to learn Bordeaux but cool(ish) climate Chilean CS always beats left bank of Gironde and Merlot based wines have never hugely excited me if I am honest. Such is life, and such is wine.

We’ve done very, very well from Chile recently. Domus Aurea Cabernet and Casa Silva Microterroir de los Lingues Carmenere have been fantastic at around £25 – both came from Oddbins so may not be available. Dead Arm is an awesome wine too, very punchy but also very complex and fairly easy to get hold of.

If you’re going French I would suggest a good Burgundy from a good wine merchant, or a southern Rhone but not a Chateauneuf du Pape – seems very overrated – sure the top wines are amazing but you don’t get them for £30. A good Gigondas or Cotes du Rhone Villages Cairanne will outdo a CdP at that sort of money.

[EDIT – nothern Rhone is also good – he may appreciate a Cornas or a good St Joseph, be careful when buying the latter as there is a lot of expensive but not very good StJ about.]

Bordeaux has always been a mystery to me.

I quite often do half and half. It’s slightly more hassle but no slower in the morning than riding all way in or using public transport (I work in Edinburgh city centre so driving in isn’t a realistic option even if I wanted to). I leave the car in a park and ride (doesn’t seem to bother anyone) and pedal in from there. Have the bike on a rack which saves a lot of hassle and I have a change of clothes and towel in case I get soaked/ flithy on way back. I can do the switchover from driving to riding in about 3 mins now.

Have loads of options from road (20 mins on road bike by most direct route) to an almost entirely offroad loop (albeit a lot is on cycle paths and similar) that takes about 1h 30 mins; there is a great network of paths through west of Edinburgh even ignoring Pentlands. If I loop up into Pentlands gives almost endless possibilities – good for summer evenings (and I reckon I ride Poet’s Glen at least 50 times a year!).

Often use a CX bike in winter so ride in on road in the morning and do something a bit more interesting on way home (I try to never do less than an hour a day if I do anything!). In summer often take the MTB and do a longer ride on the way back to car (longest was 40 miles and 4.5 hours but that was a bit of a miscalculation!).

I do ride all the way in sometimes – about 15 miles by most direct (and by far the fastest) route but that is a busy A road but it has a narrow section for about 5 miles so I only use that in emergencies – takes about 45-50 mins. Quiet roads add a couple of miles and 10 mins or so onto that but is far more pleasant and add variety.

Try to do that a couple of times a week in summer, but rarely after the clocks go back as half of it is unlit.

Main thing for me is variety – same route every day would do my head in, I probably do 3-4 days a week and mix up routes and bikes as I feel like it, and I still enjoy riding at the weekend.

+1 for Boak.

Having ridden same routes on both many times, road bike is quicker on everything. In Alps I can do about 800-850m ascent an hour on a road bike and about 600m/ hour on an MTB on tarmac – both where it is basically a long climb.

We rode the Joux Plan (HC Tour climb) from Samoens twice in the same week, all way up on road bikes and about 2/3 of way up on MTB in similar sort of time. Road bike was clearly faster, both pretty hard work, MTB gave an awesome descent, road bike a great circuit.

Hardest climbs I’ve done have all been offroad though – roads tend not to do much more than 20% for any length of time but offroad all bets off.

Rode the longish way in. It rained. Went for beers, got train home with bike. A strategy packed full of WIN.

You sound almost disappointed ;-)

Looks like we might be back to St Andrew Square again after all.

http://edinburghnews.scotsman.com/topstories/Dramatic-Uturn-by-SNP-will.6828345.jp

The whole thing is, in the words of Malcolm Tucker, an omnishambles. I won’t believe we are getting a tram until I am sitting on a real moving one.

Don’t really have anything to add as a 7-time Ciclo veteran.

On tyres, tubeless is mostly about thorn protection. We’re on proper UST set-up and apart from one nightmare trip when I wrecked 3 tyres and ended up at the mercy of Froy’s Cave of Delights it’s been fine. Some people have used Slime tubes successfully when we’ve been out too.

On tyres, I go to a 2.25 UST Crossmark on the back and 2.35 LUST High Roller on the front, seems to work pretty well. Marco swears by Larsens. You will do a reasonable amount of up (only way to get to the best stuff) so wouldn’t go more than single ply DH tyres.