2024 UK politics - now with Labour in charge

I think a better conclusion would be "OECD concluded that the current taxation regime for multinationals results in a lower average rate of corporation tax than a reasonable person would have expected".

This conclusion doesn't veer into moral judgements and also avoids potentially defamatory comments about auditors and finance directors and simply sets the scene for a rational discussion about how to achieve the best outcome for society via tax policy, of which corporation tax policy is but a relatively small part.

Consider the recent discussion about the pensions tax regime. There are many voices here arguing that the tax benefits for saving via pensions in the UK are too heavily skewed towards those who don't really need incentivising and that the regime could do with changing. But there was no suggestion that anyone benefitting from such tax benefits was doing anything wrong, acting immorally or cooking their tax returns etc. I may be in a minority, but I think the debate on the pensions tax regime was of a higher quality than this multinational tax debate, given the lack of subjectivity and emotion involved. But each to their own, I guess.

But much more objectivity I would say.

Moral judgements are pretty much wholly subjective, given that the really bad stuff in life is illegal. (Noting that life evolves, and the law plays "catch up" with new offences.)

In this specific case? Or are you just saying more generally that it does happen, which of course it does. Although to a much smaller extent than you are implying, if you read the HMRC reports linked upthread.

As mentioned above, if you have any evidence of Starbucks wrongdoing then please post it.

Of course I don't disagree, but I don't think any company would set up in Luxembourg other than to avoid tax. As I said, it's inconvenient.

I can think of at least a few reasons to set up there (e.g. English speaking population, common law), but I'm not passing judgement on the decisions companies make. They act in the interests of their shareholders to minimise tax. I think that is fine, but it is also something that can be criticised by people who see it as tax avoidance. What's not clear to me is why you pretend it is anything other than tax avoidance.

Have Apple paid their €13bn tax that Ireland helped them to avoid yet?

That's the way to do it - give tax breaks, then get forced into collecting the tax anyway. Win win.

As I said above, there was no issue with the amount of tax paid by Starbucks in the UK (maybe fro DB and Jezyboy, but not from HMRC). And no issue with the amount of tax that Starbucks paid in Lux on loans or in NL on royalties, so where is the tax being avoided?

What you appear to be complaining about is that countries set different tax rates and surprise, surprise, some companies choose to set up where their tax costs are lower, but that is not tax avoidance. Typically a decision will not be made solely on tax, but tax is a business cost just like any other so cannot be ignored.

Not necessarily moral though.

There is long established case law on this which I know outraged one Rick Chasey when I explained this to him:

"Lord Clyde in Ayrshire Pullman Motor Services and Ritchie v IRC [1929] 14 TC 754 stated the legal position in relation to tax: ‘No man in this country is under the smallest obligation, moral or other, so to arrange his legal relations to his business or to his property as to enable the Inland Revenue to put the largest possible shovel into his stores. The Inland Revenue is not slow – and quite rightly – to take every advantage which is open to it under the taxing statutes for the purpose of depleting the taxpayer’s pocket. And the taxpayer is, in like manner, entitled to be astute to prevent, so far as he honestly can, the depletion of his means by the Inland Revenue.’ "

Nice of them to give a summary of how bad things were during the tory tenure.

Yup. 'Disingenuous' springs to mind. But it does with most Telegraph headlines.

The headline might just as well have been "Living standards increase at slowest rate in 50 years as sales of tofu soar"

Relatively small beer maybe, but this is bound to enrage a few lefties:

Law of unintended consequences and maybe one for the irony thread?

Forget where I saw this previously, but did wonder why there was quite so much bleating from private schools. If they are suddenly able to reclaim VAT on what must be fairly significant annual sums on maintenance and refurbishment. Not sure what anyone would be outraged about. Gotta keep the punters happy with shiny new arts centres and whatnot.

I'm not sure the average person is aware of how the Capital Goods Scheme works and that the Labour rules change would generate a refund for past expenditure. Try reading article, as it appears that even INYT readers don't understand this 😉

But the immigration is needed in a large part due to all those economically inactive. The headline implies immigration is the cause of the issue before the final paragraph finally explains the real cause.

Most of their costs are staff with no VAT. Being able to recover VAT means they don't need to increase fees by the full 20%, but they do need to increase them. They also get to reclaim some historic stuff, but that's a one off.

Bleating about taxing education seems fair game to me.