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20 Sep 2010
Chief Treasury secretary Danny Alexander has unveiled a £900m attack on " morally indefensible" tax avoidance and evasion expected to increase government tax revenues by £7bn a year.
The campaign was endorsed by deputy prime minister Nick Clegg at the Liberal Democrat Party Conference in Liverpool where he declared: "People who avoid and evade paying their taxes will no longer get away with either."
He said that for the richest people in the country to "dodge" their tax bills was as bad as benefit cheats and promised to be "tough on tax cheats too".
It was part of a political offensive to "sell" to party activists the need for severe cuts in public spending to deal with the deficit.
In an historic first statement from the Treasury during a Lib Dem conference, HMRC said the extra funding will be used to provide more robust criminal deterrence against tax evasion, the creation of a new dedicated team of investigators to crackdown on offshore tax evasion, the creation of bespoke cyber crime teams and online specialists and more investment in freight and detection technology to prevent alcohol and tobacco smuggling.
Alexander said in his keynote speech: "There are some people who seem to believe that not paying their fair share of tax is a lifestyle choice that is socially acceptable. It is not.
"Like the benefit cheat, their actions take resources from those who need them most.
"Decisions we make in the spending review will ensure the taxman has the resources to be ruthless with those often wealthy people and businesses who think they can treat paying tax as an optional extra.
"Tax avoidance and evasion are unacceptable in the best of times, but in today's circumstances it is morally indefensible."
His comments were delivered the day Lord Ashcroft confirmed he will stand down as deputy Conservative chairman, blaming Tory leader David Cameron's decision to join the televised leaders' debate during the general election campaign for contributing to the party's failure to win an outright majority in a book, 'Minority Report', on the conduct of the campaign.
Ashcroft is believed to be unhappy his own position was not defended more strongly by party leaders when it was revealed he had not been paying UK tax on all of his overseas business empire and was accused of reneging on a promise to give up "non dom" tax status as a condition for getting a peerage.
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Visitor comments Add your comment
Tax Avoidance or Tax Evasion?
Someone ought to remind the Chief Secretary to the Treasury and other politicians including Nick Clegg that tax avoidance is still legal. Or have we become a Marxist state where each will receive from the State according to his needs irrespective of how much he earns or how and where he earns it. By the LibDem definition even personal allowances and capital gains tax relief are avoidance!
Posted by: Finian Manson, 20 Sep 2010 | 00:00
I'm not holding my breath
I'll believe it when it happens.
Unless and until there is sweeping and simple anti avoidance tax legislation that is fully applied and enforced by HMRC and upheld and supported by the Courts this 'launch' by Danny Alexander is just something meant to show the LibDem rank and file that their leadership really aren't ConDems.
Posted by: Philip Winter, 20 Sep 2010 | 00:00
Tax Avoidance or Tax Evasion?
Someone ought to remind the Chief Secretary to the Treasury and other politicians including Nick Clegg that tax avoidance is still legal. Or have we become a Marxist state where each will receive from the State according to his needs irrespective of how much he earns or how and where he earns it. By the LibDem definition even personal allowances and capital gains tax relief are avoidance!
Posted by: Finian Manson, 20 Sep 2010 | 00:00
Mistake?
Actually I think you'll find the conference was in Liverpool, not Bournemouth. Shum mistake?
Posted by: Nicki, 20 Sep 2010 | 00:00
Here we go again
It must be 1-2 years now since the Guardian's Tax Gap series, but presumably the same old extreme views will be rolled it (with ultimately no change).
It?s a moral outrage!/provided that it isn't tax evasion its lawful business practice*
* - delete as applicable.
Yawn
Posted by: Ben, 20 Sep 2010 | 00:00
Tax avoidance - legal, but unfairly available
The point about tax avoidance is that opportunities to reduce one's tax liability are (at present) mostly available to high-earners. We need to rectify the current, grossly unfair situation where the wealthiest often pay proportionally much less in tax (and sometimes none at all!) than those on low or middle incomes.
A simpler and more rigorous system, with reasonable exemptions but no 'loopholes', would have many positive effects. People would see it as fairer; individuals and companies with a commitment to the U.K. and to ethical behaviour would be better able to compete; the national budget would be easier to manage and tax lawyers would get less work (I like that one).
This is not Marxism, it's simply fairness and common sense. Indeed, if we as a nation are going to refute the arguments of the ranting prophets of the far left ? which may become more attractive to many, in these difficult times ? then we need to address those critical parts of their analysis which have a basis in real injustice. This is one such area of legislation and policy.
I look forward to hearing more from Danny Alexander and his coalition colleagues, and indeed to seeing whether Iain Duncan Smith's proposals (aimed at removing the 'poverty trap') take hold. We can and should be treating all fairly, without undue disadvantage to those who can't play the benefits game as skilfully or shamelessly, or to those who don't employ clever accountants and tax lawyers.
I sincerely hope they mean it!
Posted by: Rikki Nadir, 21 Sep 2010 | 00:00
Credibility issue
Is this article credible when your reporter states the speech came from Bournemouth when in fact the conference is taking place in Liverpool?
Or is it a case of never letting the facts get in the way?
Posted by: Aidan Sergent, 21 Sep 2010 | 00:00
Typo
Thanks for spotting the "Bournemouth" typo. It has now been changed.
Posted by: Kevin Reed, 21 Sep 2010 | 00:00
bigots pandering to the cackling masses
The emphasis here should be on "fair".
Any tax system which rapes your pension savings and which aggregates more than 1/2 your income in taxes cannot be fair.
Furthermore any tax system cannot be fair which encourages/promotes/subsidises "families" to have more than 2 children when (i) England is grossly overpopulated, (ii) population growth is by far the greatest cause of accepted "global warming" and depletion of the planet's resources.
Finally, any tax system which unilaterally rewards immigrants and their families with "benefits" e.g. health care, when those immigrants have never contributed to those services/benefits cannot be fair.
Is it any surprise then that right thinking people baulk at the idea of paying for a bloated state which marginalises them and benefits them little?
Posted by: Criss Roger, 22 Sep 2010 | 00:00