More from "U2 must believe in Tax Justice":
Photo: I. Irigoien
And from the Irish Times:
Protesters have demonstrated outside the Department of Finance against U2's decision to move their tax affairs to the Netherlands to avoid paying tax on their royalties in Ireland.
The protest was organised by the Debt and Development Coalition Ireland (DDCI) which campaigns on issues related to the developing world. The coalition contains such organisations as Concern Worldwide, Tr??caire, Oxfam and various Catholic missionary orders.
U2 moved their publishing arm to the Netherlands in 2006 after the Government capped tax-free earnings for artists at €250,000. Previously, U2 had been one of the biggest beneficiaries of Ireland's tax-free status for artist royalties.
Accounts for 2007 for U2 Ltd show the band paid out more than €21 million in wages in 2007 in a relatively quiet year where they were not touring or releasing new material.
Bono impersonator Paul O'Toole reworked the lyrics of I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For to mock the band's decision. "I know avoiding tax ain't fair/it's just because I'm a millionaire, I don't need to pay like you, no, I won't pay like you/because I still haven't learned about democracy."
Mr O'Toole said: "Their music does not bother me. It is their policy of avoiding tax that bothers me. Bono talks about dead kids, but he won't pay a penny towards it."
Mr O'Toole posed with a mock-up of a donation to the world's poor in one hand and a large sack of unpaid tax in the other.
The DDCI is following it up with the launch of an "international song contest" inviting re-worded versions of U2 classics to highlight the band's stance on tax.
It is timed to coincide with the release of U2's new album No Line on the Horizon which goes on sale at midnight on Friday.
DDCI co-ordinator Nessa n?? Chasa??de said the decision to holding the protest outside the department of Finance was to highlight the fact that U2's tax avoidance measures deprives the Irish exchequer of taxation revenue that could be spent on development aid.
"Bono has championed the call for increases in aid to impoverished countries, yet in his personal life he is engaged in tax avoidance issues and it is tax avoidance that is undermining the possibility of developing countries fighting their way out of poverty," she said.
"The practice of being able to move your finances around easily and without high levels of transparency is extremely problematic for developing countries. The kind of practice that U2 is engaging in is part of that problem."
Nobody from U2 was available for comment, but the band will defend their tax measures in an extensive interview to be published in this newspaper on Friday.
I'm looking forward to the justification
And massive respect for the guys in Dublin who pulled this off from me!
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Dear editor.
I lie somewhere between bemusement and appalled at Bono’s incredible assertion regarding his offshore accounts. The only ‘hypocritical’
idea he said was that (back) ‘then you couldn’t use a financial services centre in Holland’. Bono implied that the absence of tax
avoidance instruments in the past is what is hypocritical, this comment came after the Debt and Development Coalition
protest outside the Department of Finance last wednesday had accused Bono himself of hypocracy, just hours prior to the release of U2’s latest album.
We have a man, Bono, on behalf of U2, who says that (outside their fanbase) theres ‘no point in trying to explain ourselves’, regarding their
avioding paying tax in a country they claim to be citizens.
The problem with Bono and U2, is not that they have made obscene ammounts of money, creating immense wealth made even easier by availing of
generous tax exemptions for struggling artists over the past 32 years in Ireland, and not that they have moved ‘part of their business’
to the Netherlans to avoid paying tax on anything over 250,000 /year- (2007 U2 paid itself 21 million), and not because David ‘The Edge’
says… ‘we dont comment on it for very good reason….and thats because its our own private thing’.
The problem is Bono’s insistence on governments to meet mileninum goals of 0.7% of G.D.P. by 2015, through central taxation to help alleviate
hunger in Sub-Saharan Africa-a very good cause. But who does he expect to pay this?. Kids working part time jobs to pay for your overpriced U2
concert tickets pay it, mothers, fathers who buy your albums pay it, grandparents who buy your t-shirts for their grandchildren pay for it. Hard
working, tax paying Irish citizens, with no tax exemptions because they dont work as ‘artists’, and with no option but to pay into the central
taxation purse, pay for it.Not Bono, and not U2.
Nor do Bono or U2 pay their share of the 160 billion each year in Corporate Tax avoidance schemes which if paid, would allow some starving African
children to see another day, 30,000 African children wont see tomorrow according to Bono himself. So if Bono and U2 would like to shed the
notion that they might be getting labeled as hypocrites in the wrong, they might move part of their hard gotten earnings back to this island they call
home and allow our revenue have a little piece of it. Especially in these hard economic times when essential services here in Ireland also need cash.
Paul OToole.
11 Thorndale Park,
Artane Dublin 5.
Non-tax exempt artist/
singer/songwriter
Recent Bono Impersonator.
Beautifully put Mr. OToole!
@Erika
Had no idea and am quite surprized that a band like U2 would be guilty of something like this!Way to supprt the motherland!Thanks for the eye opener Mr O’Toole.Let me know and i’ll come and play “slide bass” with ya and mock up some more U2 songs!
Gus
I have a family and i earn 600 per week before tax i now earn 400 euro after tax to pay mortgage,etc i am paying tax levy as low paid civil servanti have paid to see u2 in leixlip 1980,croke park 85,87,rds 93 best ever zooropa,97 landsdowne,2001 slane,2005 croke park, i will never buy your songs again