On 11 Feb 2015 at 1:21pm Merlin Milner wrote:
Just to be clear in the previous thread on this.
I was as not smearing Tony Benn, far from it. Just wanted the facts to be presented rather than the unsubstantiated views from an earlier poster. Sorry that my finger problems made my original link useless and I 'eventually' corrected this. I apologise for all future uselessness.
Also my post explaining what the Inland Revenue were doing with tax avoiders was not meant to be my opinion but my understanding of their methods.
On 11 Feb 2015 at 3:26pm bastian wrote:
Given that the inland revenue is funded by governement funds, via tax-it makes it very difficult for them to find enough money to take tax avoiders to court, because there hasn't been enough tax put into the tax pot by the scum who are assisted to take their money off shore by big banks. Tricky!
It is either we all pay tax, or no one pays tax. Not some poorer people do and the well off don't. It is pure anarchy to treat a country like this, it destabilises the civilised system. When government talks about people being anarchists they mean standing up for their rights and protesting in the streets or going on strike about an issue of dispute, when in fact, and by the book, to seperate yourself from the central point and refuse to pay into the same system whilst others do, is anarchy, each man living unto his own rule. More than anything it's selfish and stagnates an entire country. But when your governemnt condones the practice by promoting one of the leading lights of the fiasco onto their benches then what do you expect.
Time to stop listening to the business world until it can behave itself in a proper and decent manner-treat its employees like human beings and look to the future instead of grasping at quick money now.
On 11 Feb 2015 at 4:53pm Merlin Milner wrote:
Indeed. However, lets support good businesses and politicians; investigate the bad ones and ensure that justice is achieved. Remember though that at the end of the world we will be left with lawyers and cockroaches.
On 11 Feb 2015 at 5:16pm Clifford wrote:
And how exactly how we to 'support' businesses and politicians when we usually find out after the event that they are not 'good'? Green was 'good', an ordained priest no less.
On 11 Feb 2015 at 5:54pm Merlin Milner wrote:
"we usually find out after the event that they are not 'good'". Well lets all slash are wrists and leave this wicked world then. There are many very good businesses out there, just like there are good people. On a personal level we evaluate people and businesses and we hope that our evolution has been correct; however we all make mistakes and hopefully learn from them. If we assumed that all people were bad we would be Billy no mates.
On 11 Feb 2015 at 7:00pm Clifford wrote:
What i mean, Merlin, is that it might not be the people who are 'bad' but the system they are working in rewards not being 'good'.
On 11 Feb 2015 at 7:11pm Merlin Milner wrote:
OK. I am not sure that the system always discriminates between good and bad so both can coexist.
On 12 Feb 2015 at 9:27am Belladonna wrote:
Let's face it, the 'system' has allowed these people to get away with it, therefore we have to change the system. Banks will have to be highly regulated if they can't play by the rules and regulate themselves. Some people will always take advantage and need to be regulated - it happens in every section of society. The banks and financial markets have had their unregulated way and it's not working for the vast majority of people. The banks are like toddlers without boundaries. They've been allowed to run riot for the last 30 years and have created a massive mess. Now they have to forego their pudding until they've cleared it up...
On 12 Feb 2015 at 11:13am Reality wrote:
Until bankers are paid more in line with everyone else who contribute essential services ( I am prepared to accept that we need banking) then I can only see the industry as a greedy bunch of integrity-free thieves who take advantage of the control they have of our money. If people like David Cameron wants to endorse this kind of thing with Peerages, then I suggest that if they have a heart attack, only Peers are allowed to look after them.
On 12 Feb 2015 at 12:13pm Merlin Milner wrote:
I agree BD. De-regulation of the banks in the 80s was the beginning of this current nonsense. Merchant banking is an overcomplicated internally facing industry that does little for most businesses outside its industry. It has lured physicists and mathematicians away from cutting edge science to make one bank more competitive than another, but this benefit is rarely passed on to the non-banking community. However the genie is out of the bottle. Despite the rhetoric this government has done more than others in the recent past. Mainly because it has had to and much much more needs to be done, especially internationally. We need to keep the pressure up.
On 12 Feb 2015 at 5:14pm Dity rotten fink. wrote:
This government has done more than others to crack down on tax avoidance ?Of course it has Merlin,of course it has.Ha ha Ha.I love Lib Dems don`t you!
On 12 Feb 2015 at 5:52pm Pink Floyd wrote:
@ Belladonna -Ye cannae have yer pudding if ye dinnae eat yer meat.
On 12 Feb 2015 at 9:56pm Fairmeadow wrote:
So heartened by your assurance Merlin that Amazon, Starbucks, Boots, Apple, Facebook, Lord Fink and our local landed estates now pay their taxes just like everyone else, thanks to the Coalition government's firm stance. But if they had, surely government tax receipts would have shot through the roof, so that the austerity programme could be declared unnecessary.
If only it was true. Back in the real world the pirate companies, hedge funds, large accountancy firms, rip-off banks and rich individuals, who I'm sure cannot possibly include any Tory donors or school friends of Call-Me-Dave, have continued unchecked under the Con-LibDem coalition. Companies that don't pay their fair share of tax, like Amazon etc, continue to drive honest businesses to the wall.
I have grave doubts about Mr Miliband, but at least he has recognised the issue and dared to speak out about it. As things stand, he is likely to get my vote. Just watch out for who tries to rubbish him on this issue - a 100% reliable indicator of who not to touch with a barge-pole.
On 12 Feb 2015 at 11:06pm wrote:
You forgot to include Vodaphone, the company HMRC boss dave Hartnett did a deal with to let them off £2b. Yes, that is billion.
I wonder if you can guess which international banking business he went on to advise on financial crime governance after his retirement soon afterwards.
We're all in this together.
On 12 Feb 2015 at 11:06pm wrote:
You forgot to include Vodaphone, the company HMRC boss dave Hartnett did a deal with to let them off £2b. Yes, that is billion.
I wonder if you can guess which international banking business he went on to advise on financial crime governance after his retirement soon afterwards.
We're all in this together.
On 13 Feb 2015 at 12:34am Ex Lib Dem Voter wrote:
I am sure you mean well Merlin, but I think you are a little deluded defending this one. Mr Fink just says it all, for this greedy bunch of antisocial egotists, when he presumes that we are all involved in tax avoidance. He also presumes that most people have the choices he has about how to pay tax, and also that people have as little integrity as him. The Lib Dems should be asking him to share his 'vanilla' tax avoidance advice , since he thinks we would all benefit from it, and would all do it. To suggest that everything is OK because tax payers are now paying an additional fortune to get money back is simply ludicrous. It is not OK, none of this is good, and it has the whiff of the expenses and hacking scandals about it. ie everyone knew it was going on, but either thought they could get away with it or were too weedy to challenge it...or worse. A Peerage should be awarded to the whistleblower, not the person he blew the whistle on!
On 13 Feb 2015 at 9:06am Merlin Milner wrote:
Show me how Labour did more before 2010. I am not saying this government has done loads, far from it. Also I did not mention the Lib Dems either. Re-read my post. Loads more needs to be done irrespective of which government is in power. Amazon et al were at it before 2010 and that is my point and I agree that this mass greedy avoidance has to stop. We have to tighten, simplify tax law and prosecute. However the main tenant of my post has been ignored. It is the externally pointlessness merchant banking and its profiteering since deregulation that needs urgent international reform.
On 13 Feb 2015 at 10:43am Ed Can Do wrote:
Lord Rothermere is a big Tory party donor who is a non-dom (Lives in London mind you) and has registered his vast property empire and media company holdings as being owned by a complicated string of off-shore businesses so he can swere tax on any income or wealth he has in this country.
So don't expect too many stories about tax avoidance being a bad thing in the Mail any time soon.
There are so many big Tory donors who pay no tax it's amazing that Milliband hasn't made much better political capital out of this. The only explanation is that his own party is equally reliant on funding from people who choose not to pay tax.
Which of course it is.
Like the expenses scandal, we can expect this to be all over the papers for a week or so, there to be an enquiry lasting several years at huge expense run by some people up to their necks in the whole affair anyway which will slap a couple of people on the wrist and then everyone will carry on as before. Nobody will go to jail, nobody will pay any extra tax and the main political parties will continue to be bought and paid for by tax thieves.
On 13 Feb 2015 at 2:17pm Merlin Milner wrote:
Political funding needs to be looked at urgently. At the very least political funding needs to be capped so as to reduce large influential donations. Otherwise we will become more like the US where only those with money can enter politics and where money dictates policy. This election shows how the disconnect is having devastating effects upon our democracy.
On 13 Feb 2015 at 9:41pm Green bee wrote:
The answer is to vote Green. No one funds them but their members via crowd funding. Greens are beholden to no one but the greater good. And as such, are the only truly independent party our there, the only ones who are able to take the banks, the tax evaders and the other smelly gits to task.
:-)
On 13 Feb 2015 at 10:31pm Green and Red wrote:
Vote Green and get Cameron/Clegg/Farage I`m afraid.
On 14 Feb 2015 at 9:24am Better Dead wrote:
Than green/red