I have been told by a number of people that they are having problems with my RSS and email feeds I apologise. This originates in an old Feedburner problem which meant that this blog ended up with two feed addresses. The old one began to malfunction in late January and seemed to die on February
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Having said that there is just one article you need to read today, let me add another. It’s a Guardian blog called This special offer must end soon and it’s by, well, me. What I’ve done is contextualise the harm that Tescos’ tax deal causes. Let’s not understate that harm: it is substantial.

Polly Toynbee’s article in today’s Guardian lets another Tescos tax story out of the bag: Since Tesco has murmured to other newspapers that it may sue the Guardian, to warn others against following our story – though no writ has arrived – let’s stress that these low-tax paying habits are all very, very legal, all
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If you read just one thing today make it Polly Toynbee’s article in today’s Guardian entitled Fairness is forgotten in a culture of tax avoidance that shames Britain. I won’t quote much here – it deserves to be read in full. Suffice with this: We boast with great arrogance of the pre-eminence of our world-beating
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These are my links for February 28th: MPs call for inquiry into Tesco’s tax avoidance | Business | The Guardian – Can Vince Cable do a thing wrong right now? He’s spot on here. Leader: Avoiding responsibility | Comment is free | The Guardian – Pay your taxes !

These are my links for February 27th: Tax havens are getting more popular, more dangerous – and more useful – International Herald Tribune – The OECD says it does not want to put tax havens out of business. Nor do I. But I do want to end the secrecy they provide. That will, as it
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Guess what? The Center for Freedom and Prosperity (the ‘tax cheats lobby’ according to David Cay Johnston in ‘Perfectly Legal’) has come out and said of Liechtenstein tax fraud: Blame German Tax Law, Not Liechtenstein Privacy Law Staggering.

Forbes has a good article on this today. I admit I recognise quite a lot of what is said. What is interesting is that Forbes says: What of the full-trained accountants, lawyers and bankers who live and work in these havens and allow such funds to be passed through? In many cases they simply don’t
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The Guardian has published some good old fashioned investigative reporting on Tescos today. As it says: Tesco has created an elaborate corporate structure involving offshore tax havens which enables it to avoid paying what could be up to £1bn of tax on profits from the sale of its UK properties. The complex new structures uncovered
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