When I was co-authoring 'Tax Havens: How Globalization Really Works' (Cornell Studies in Money) with Ronen Palan and Christian Chavagneux we faced a dilemma. It was that no one - ourselves included - had adequately defined a tax haven. I'd venture to suggest that this remains the case to date. That is why I took on the challenge of defining something else that could provide a policy basis for action - which was the secrecy jurisdiction.
I didn't create the term secrecy jurisdiction. I did define it. I said that secrecy jurisdictions are places that intentionally create regulation for the primary benefit and use of those not resident in their geographical domain. I added that this regulation is designed to undermine the legislation or regulation of another jurisdiction and that to facilitate its use secrecy jurisdictions also create a deliberate, legally backed veil of secrecy that ensures that those from outside the jurisdiction making use of its regulation cannot be identified to be doing so.
The term has since been widely adopted, and sometimes been reverse engineered to be a definition of a tax haven (as Nick Shaxson did in his book Treasure Islands, for example).
Now David Cameron has declared that the tax haven is dead.
Let me assure you, the secrecy jurisdiction is not.
Cameron's claim is meaningless since he cannot define a tax haven. My claim is not. I can define a secrecy jurisdiction.
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You say geographical domain. However Jersey, or the Isle of Man is inside the UK. Now the BVI is partly a UK overseas territory, and does fly the flag. So really they are the UK and will be until they are not.
Its a bit like saying that Scotland is another county and anyone who owns a house there or a business or bank account has an ulterior motive.
Now until the 19th September 2014, it is a UK country. Just like Jersey, the BVI or the Cayman Islands.
I think you need to do some basic geography lessons
Richard, I agree with your comment on Goldfinger. The Channel Islands are NOT part of the United Kingdom: instead they are the last survival of the Duchy of Normandy, and the Queen is, I believe, actually there so recognized.
They and the Isle of Man are part of the British Isles – but, then, so is Eire, even though it is a separate State – and perhaps also of Great Britain, which only came into existence at the Union of the Crowns in 1603.
These various territories are held together, as was Scotland and England until 1707, solely by the fact of having the same ultimate ruler – the monarch. That is the legal situation, and if Scotland votes for independence we will be back to the 1603-1707 situation – unless they vote for FULL separation.
The political and constitutional situation, as you have often pointed out, Richard, is that all these various territories (excluding Scotland) have no independent rights of Foreign or military activity, nor, in truth, of any extra-territorial activity, which includes the effects of their taxation policies on non-residents. The UK could, therefore, take action to prevent people making use of the secrecy offered by these various territories, but has so far failed to do so.
More doublespeak from David Cameron. What he is really saying is not that the tax havens are dead it is that the issue of their wealth extraction activities is dead.
Cameron is trying to direct us to look elsewhere and not “behind the curtain”. When public attention is directed elsewhere, the tax havens can continue their nefarious ways undisturbed.
They can remain a safe harbour for the corrupt shadow banking system, wholesale money laundering for rogue governments, the criminal fraternity and terrorists; and industrial scale tax evasion and avoidance.
You are right
Richard is so right in pointing out the need to define ‘tax haven’ before asserting that any particular location is, or is not, a tax haven.
As a Guernsey citizen I have lost count of the number of times denials are issued in the local media when neither the original nor the denial give any indication of what they are talking about.
But I take issue with Andrew Dickie: the Channel Islands are definitely not part of Great Britain. In 1204 King John adhered them to the English Crown to be ‘separate and distinct from the kingdom of England’.
Whether they are part of the British Isles is a very controversial issue. It depends on how you define ‘British Isles’. There are some who maintain that the term includes all the islands off the NW coast of Europe including, for example, the Faroes, Heligoland, and Ushant. My own view is that the term does not include the Channel Islands which are in the first instance offshore islands of Normandy and separated from the British Isles by the ancient river named Hurd whose valley is now the Hurd Deep in the English Channel. The Hurd would have been a significant item, taking the combined flows of the Thames, Rhine, and Seine amongst others.
David
As you well know – the 1204 references may all be fiction
No one has any of the original documents
Which may be the foundation of the Guernsey secrecy jurisdiction
Richard
Richard
The 1204 documents have been good enough for every British government since then. It is inconceivable that the relationship could have been anything other than what it was agreed to be at that time. It was also good enough for the EU to accept our constitutional status under the Treaty of Rome in 1972.
We are very clearly not part of the United Kingdom. I believe the term British Isles is purely a geographical term. I think we are part of Great Britain though, as that is a constitutional term rather than a geographical term.
Please produce the documents
That’s my request
Where are they?
Under lock and key I believe!
Where are all the original documents for the constitutions of other countries? If they aren’t available does that make those countries null and void ?
No, come on – tell me where
Where is there even a copy?
Tell me
(Hint: they don’t exist, and I know it)
Wikipedia – not, of course, infallible – has the following:
The United Kingdom has sovereignty over seventeen territories which do not form part of the United Kingdom itself: fourteen British Overseas Territories[134] and three Crown Dependencies.[135] […]
The Crown Dependencies are British possessions of the Crown, as opposed to overseas territories of the UK.[140] They comprise the Channel Island Bailiwicks of Jersey and Guernsey in the English Channel and the Isle of Man in the Irish Sea. Being independently administered jurisdictions they do not form part of the United Kingdom or of the European Union, although the UK government manages their foreign affairs and defence and the UK Parliament has the authority to legislate on their behalf. The power to pass legislation affecting the islands ultimately rests with their own respective legislative assemblies, with the assent of the Crown (Privy Council or, in the case of the Isle of Man, in certain circumstances the Lieutenant-Governor).[141]
The note [140] mentioned above reads as follows:
The Committee Office, House of Commons. “House of Commons — Crown Dependencies — Justice Committee”. Publications.parliament.uk. Retrieved 7 November 2010. (Reference http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200910/cmselect/cmjust/56/5604.htm)
So it would seem the Parliament does not consider the Crown Dependencies to be part of the United Kingdom.
I agree
They are not
But there’s still no treaty of 1204
Richard
It was issued by Royal Charter. Nobody of any relevance has ever questioned the validity of such Royal Chartes. We are talking about 1204. How much was written in those days?
The relationship has been based on practice, custom, convention, usage plus statutes enacted in Westminster. The UK has never been in any doubt about the validity of the constitution. There is clearly acceptance that it did exist in 1204.
Most Royal Charters do exist from that time
There is no evidence of this one
Is it a wok of fiction?
I’m no constitutional expert but I’m pretty sure that the behaviour of two parties in agreement over many centuries is evidence of some basis for that agreement. It comes down to a balance of probabilities.
I’m not disputing that
I am saying that there is a mighty lot of hype in here which may have no foundation in truth