Because I was laid up with a really heavy cold over the weekend I did not blog an article featuring my work that was in the Observer yesterday. As they reported:
Virgin Care, which has been handed contracts worth hundreds of millions of pounds to run more than 230 NHS and social care services, is one of at least 10 private health firms seeking state-funded contracts whose company structures include tax havens, it can be revealed.
An analysis by Richard Murphy, a chartered accountant at Tax Research UK, has found 13 holding companies, some of them offshore, between Virgin Care and its ultimate parent company, based in the British Virgin Islands.
I recommend the rest of the article, unsurprisingly, although a couple of minor technical errors have crept into the Observer's reporting which do not, however, change the substance.
Since the work I undertook was for Unite, the Union I am not sure when the report will be published as yet as I have not yet been told. What I can say is that the conclusion of the work is clear, and that is that tax avoidance is at the heart of the structuring of many of the outsourced NHS contractors, and much of that tax avoidance involves offshore tax havens. I think that is unacceptable and so too do Unite, which is why I am pleased to work with them on this issue.
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Virgin running social care.
The mind boggles. Oh wait: Virgin hiring NHS trained-at-public-expense staff, then running a profit-shifted business…..ok, seems the Virgin Business model. I’ll buy that for a nickel..
No doubt some of these Tax Havens are ex British Colonies, dependencies etc.
Known about this for ages, but it has been difficult to find out, because of commercial confidentiality.
My local surgery is now owned by Virgincare, although not under that name. Brand new building, nice big car park, but a council run care home was knocked down to make way for it.
When they had an exhibition to show us how fantastic this new surgery was going to be, we looked through the information, and Virgincare was not mentioned. However, as we pointed out to anyone who would listen, neither was NHS!
Richard Branson lives in the British Virgin Islands. Surely that’s the best place to base his business!
Is the BVI a tax haven?
Not when the money he is making is from the NHS. Not many surgeries needed in the Virgin Islands.
As Rome declines, the looting begins.
This is just wrong on so many levels.
Seems there is no level the tax avoidance industry won’t stoop to. Nothing is off limits.
I read the article – what was not clear was how viable it would be if the companies bidding for NHS contracts had to pay full UK taxes. The sensible thing would be:
a) bids only from UK companies
b) said UK companies have beneficial owners tax resident in the UK (& can only ever have UK-tax resident owners)
c) there – done.
The evidence of this report – now out – and other work to follow is that privatisation is not viable
Universal health care supply cannot be undertaken on a market basis
And please don’t quote the USA – it’s health care outcomes are dire
Agreed Richard! The NHS is the envy of the world, matched only by the Cuban system. You would expect the world to learn while it watches and marvels. But no, the MacCarthyism of neoliberal idealogical doctrine means it can’t be done.
No good will come of this:
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/is-there-no-limit-to-what-this-government-will-privatise-uk-plasma-supplier-sold-to-us-private-equity-firm-bain-capital-8718029.html
“The NHS is the envy of the world, matched only by the Cuban system.”
If the NHS is the envy of the world, why are so few systems (including many European ones) not modelled on it?
And Cuba…give it a break…
How about because private interests cannot stand the competition?
Remember the theory of competition is only a theory
It is not something business has ever subscribed to
I see Sodexo is yet another private company that has thrown the keys back to the government by abandoning its contract at Brighton hospital.
The whole Health & Social Care Act is rotten to the core. It needs to be consigned to the dustbin of history.