{"id":19162,"date":"2013-02-06T10:12:23","date_gmt":"2013-02-06T10:12:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/?p=19162"},"modified":"2013-02-06T10:12:23","modified_gmt":"2013-02-06T10:12:23","slug":"hmrc-shows-it-remains-committed-to-helping-big-business-do-cosy-international-tax-deals","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/2013\/02\/06\/hmrc-shows-it-remains-committed-to-helping-big-business-do-cosy-international-tax-deals\/","title":{"rendered":"HMRC shows it remains committed to helping big business do cosy international tax deals"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The <a href=\"http:\/\/www.parliament.uk\/hlfinancebill\" target=\"_blank\">House of Lords has continued to hear evidence on the\u00a0General Anti-Abuse Rule<\/a>, the latest hearing being this week. The\u00a0transcript\u00a0has not yet been published, but <a href=\"http:\/\/www.accountancyage.com\/aa\/news\/2241471\/broader-gaar-would-cause-uncertainty-lords-told\" target=\"_blank\">Accountancy Age has reported:<\/a><\/p>\n<blockquote><p>A more widely\u00a0targeted\u00a0general anti-avoidance principle would create \"uncertainty\", provide HM Revenue &amp; Customs too much discretion and divert its resources away from other activities, Lords have been told.<\/p>\n<p>Appearing before the Economic Affairs and Finance Bill Sub-Committee, treasury director for\u00a0international business\u00a0tax Mike Williams said a wider rule -\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.accountancyage.com\/aa\/news\/2205177\/antiavoidance-bill-to-be-brought-before-parliament\" target=\"_blank\">such as the one put forward by Labour MP Michael Meacher<\/a>\u00a0that would address national insurance and VAT - would take in too many ordinary tax planning measures.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>This, very respectfully, is absurd. What we have is\u00a0H M Revenue &amp; Customs saying it does not want to tackle tax\u00a0avoidance, and most especially that of the sort that the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.telegraph.co.uk\/news\/politics\/david-cameron\/9779983\/David-Cameron-Tax-avoiding-foreign-firms-like-Starbucks-and-Amazon-lack-moral-scruples.html\" target=\"_blank\">Prime Minister is saying is wholly\u00a0unacceptable<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Why not?<\/p>\n<p>What's wrong with our tax authority taking on tax avoiders?<\/p>\n<p>Why don't they want to close the tax gap - as the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.publications.parliament.uk\/pa\/cm201213\/cmselect\/cmpubacc\/716\/71602.htm\" target=\"_blank\">Public Accounts Committee also suspected they did not wish to do<\/a>?<\/p>\n<p>And it's just nonsense to say a wider GAAR will\u00a0produce\u00a0uncertainty. Where is the uncertainty in saying that is someone tries to abuse the law they will be prevented from doing so? That provides certainty - because it stops the abuse.<\/p>\n<p>I am afraid Mike Williams shows exactly why HMRC needs top down reform. What he's actually saying is HMRC wants to continue to allow cosy tax planning deals for major multinationals whilst hiding behind the excuse that they're permitted by\u00a0regulation\u00a0which is\u00a0beyond\u00a0our control - which is utterly untrue.<\/p>\n<p>It's time for HMRC to\u00a0smell\u00a0the coffee, I think<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The House of Lords has continued to hear evidence on the\u00a0General Anti-Abuse Rule, the latest hearing being this week. The\u00a0transcript\u00a0has not yet been published, but<br \/><a class=\"moretag\" href=\"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/2013\/02\/06\/hmrc-shows-it-remains-committed-to-helping-big-business-do-cosy-international-tax-deals\/\"><em> Read the full article&#8230;<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[107],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-19162","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-hmrc"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19162","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19162"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19162\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19162"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19162"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19162"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}