Barclays’ new tax principles look very like a licence to undertake tax avoidance to me

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These are Barclays' tax principles, according to their presentation made today:

Screen shot 2013-02-12 at 17.06.17

(Click on the file for a bigger version)

Are you convinced that means an end to tax avoidance?

After all, tax authorities expect tax avoidance.

And tax avoidance is generally accepted - as the proposed General Anti-Abuse Rule explicitly recognises.

And Google has, for example, said its planning supports genuine commercial activity and it's quite relaxed about it.

And are a bank's values and purpose that good a guide to what is acceptable?

If this is Barclays moving towards acceptability I am going to take a lot of convincing.

Where's the mention of the spirit of the law? Or transparency? And what about foregoing the use of tax havens? What about consistency between substance and form? None of these are mentioned.

Sorry, but in my view this is a tax avoiders charter, not a move into the light. The fact that this was also on page 66 of 67 says a lot, I think.


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