Apple 'among largest tax avoiders in US' - Senate committee

A few days ago Google claimed that the reason it seems to be paying low taxes outside of its home country is because the buklk of its taxes are paid in the US.  Apple obviously does not have the same excuse.

From - http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-22600984

Apple has been accused of being "among America's largest tax avoiders".

A Senate committee said Apple had used "a complex web of offshore entities" to avoid paying billions of dollars in US income taxes. But it said there was no indication the firm acted illegally.

Apple chief Tim Cook will go before the panel on Tuesday. In prepared testimony Apple said it did not use tax gimmicks.

The Irish Republic, home to three Apple subsidiaries, says it is not to blame for the firm's low tax payments.

The US Senate had said that Apple paid little or nothing on billions of dollars in profits placed in Irish subsidiaries.

"They are not issues that arise from the Irish taxation system," Deputy Prime Minister Eamon Gilmore told national broadcaster RTE when asked about the Senate committee report.

"They are issues that arise from the taxation systems in other jurisdictions and that is an issue that has to be addressed first of all in those jurisdictions."

Apple has a cash stockpile of $145bn (£95bn), but the Senate committee said $102bn of this was held offshore.

The company says it is one of the largest taxpayers in the US, having paid $6bn in federal corporate income tax in the 2012 fiscal year.

The Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations has been examining "methods employed by multinational corporations to shift profits offshore".

Some large firms in the US have come under fire for their reluctance to repatriate their foreign earnings as they could face a top tax rate of 35%.

US corporation tax is one of the highest in the world at 35%. However, companies typically pay far less, thanks to numerous deductions and exemptions.

Continue reading the main storle has been accused of being "among America's largest tax avoiders".

'Google is cheating British taxpayers out of millions... what they are doing is just immoral': Web giant accused of running 'scandalous' tax avoidance scheme by whistleblower Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2326897/Google-tax-avoidance-row-Internet-giant-accused-scandalous-tax-avoidance-scheme-whistleblower.html#ixzz2TkN0odzA Follow us: @MailOnline on Twitter | DailyMail on Facebook

From - http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2326897/Google-tax-avoidance-row-Internet-giant-accused-scandalous-tax-avoidance-scheme-whistleblower.html

* Barney Jones said Google diverts British profits through Ireland to Bermuda 
* Former executive said company 'pulled the wool over the eyes' of HMRC
* Adds to mounting pressure on Google over its tax affairs 
* Company says all sales contracts go through its low-tax Ireland office 
* Last year, paid just £7.3million in corporation tax on UK turnover of £3billion

A former Google executive turned whistleblower says he has 100,000 emails that expose the 'immoral' tax avoidance scheme used by his former employer.

Barney Jones, who worked for Google from 2002 until 2006, said the company has 'pulled the wool over the eyes of HMRC and the British population'.

He claims Google has a system in place which diverts British profits through Ireland to the Bermuda tax haven and accused the company of 'cheating' the British taxpayer. 

The internet giant has been under increasing pressure about allegations of tax avoidance.

Prime Minister David Cameron will lead efforts at next month's G8 summit of world leaders to find ways of preventing multinational firms from exploiting tax loopholes.

He is due to meet Google's executive chairman Eric Schmidt tomorrow at the quarterly meeting of the prime minister's Business Advisory Group. 

Last week, Matt Brittin, a vice-president of Google, was aggressively questioned by MPs, who accused the company of 'doing evil' by using 'devious, calculated and unethical' tricks to minimise its liabilities.

It paid just £7.3million in corporation tax last year despite having a UK turnover of £3billion.

Yet, Google assert that all its sales are made in low-tax Ireland, rather than the UK, where corporation tax is just 12.5 per cent compared to 23 per cent in Britain. 

Mr Jones's earlier testimony to the PAC gave MPs such as chair Margaret Hodge further ammunition for the questioning of Mr Brittin last week.

Fury at corporate tax avoidance leads to call for a global response

From - http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2013/may/18/corporate-tax-avoidance

Anger over the financial affairs of multinationals such as Google, Amazon and Starbucks is gathering momentum in Westminster. Now the UK is poised to lead the debate about international tax reform at next month's G8 summit.i

Google's approach to its taxes has been branded as evil by Margaret Hodge, chair of the public accounts committee. Photograph: John G Mabanglo/EPA

Huge orange and green cranes hover over a vast building site at King's Cross, London. Over the next three years, 2.4 acres of this site will be transformed into a million square feet of an 11-storey headquarters for the internet giant Google, no doubt chock-a-block with colourful Big Brother-house-style sofas and surreal chill-out zones that mark out its other 70 offices in 40 countries.

The property deal is estimated to have cost around £1bn and was heralded by the site's development consortium as the "most significant property transaction of recent years".

"This is a big investment by Google, we're committing further to the UK where computing and the web were invented. It's good news for Google, for London and for the UK," said Matt Brittin, vice-president for northern and central Europe, when the purchase was announced in January.

Like Amazon, Google is seeing increasing success in the UK where one in every $10 of sales is now generated. Yet both firms claim they are merely touching down on UK soil, without a "permanent establishment" and therefore are not paying tax on profits from billions of pounds worth of sales made here.

On Wednesday, Google won the advertiser of the year trophy at the 54th annual Clio Awards – the Oscars for advertising professionals. Accepting the award in New York, Robert Wong, chief creative officer of Google Creative Lab, said: "At the highest order, our job is to remind the world what it is they love about Google."

That popularity has hit a serious snag. The next day the company was branded "evil" by Margaret Hodge, chair of the public accounts committee, while this weekend Ed Miliband called it "irresponsible". "If everyone approached their tax affairs as some of these companies have approached theirs we wouldn't have a health service, we wouldn't have an education system," he said.

Along with Amazon and, before that, Starbucks, Topshop, Boots, Vodafone, Goldman Sachs and Greene King, Google is the latest to have become the target of grassroots hostility towards their aggressivetax avoidance policies. The actions of these corporations are not illegal, nor underhand, but especially when we're all supposed to be in austerity together, jarring horribly with public opinion.

Something "doesn't smell right", as the Guardian's editorial said this weekend, after it ran an account of the extent of Amazon's dealings in the UK, far wider than what its tax lawyers are implying.

The debate is now raging over whether these companies are the happy beneficiaries of a tax system knitted with loopholes, or the malicious purveyors of smoke-and-mirror accounting. HM Revenue and Customs claims the former – public opinion is rolling towards the latter. Lin Homer, chief executive of HMRC, claimed the public don't understand. Asked why she was not taking a tougher line with internet giants, she told the public accounts committee: "We see, but understand more fully, some of the information that might seem to the general public to be surprising."

But campaigners say tax collectors and leading politicians have been caught out; too engrossed in austerity plans, they are scrabbling to keep up with people who point out that there are other ways to balance the books.

"Without a doubt, they are behind the curve," said Richard Murphy, a chartered accountant, economist and founder of Tax Justice Network. "They have all been caught by surprise because this has come from civil society, a campaign that has been going on for almost a decade but has only been picked up by politicians after the banking crisis when they suddenly realised they were desperately short of cash."

He said HMRC had been ducking tax avoidance completely. He said it had powers to tackle any suspect tax returns of foreign-based companies. "If the breach is blatant, then they can act. What we haven't got is politicians who will stand up to this. It's a critical point. If the state will not stand up for its right to tax big corporations then we are in deep trouble."

UK Uncut began campaigning on the issue in 2010 and it was its legal challenge that revealed how HMRC waived a £20m bill for Goldman Sachs, as well as a £6bn bill to Vodafone. Journalists, tax experts and campaigners have been investigating and exposing the tax scams being perpetrated by big businesses for far longer – pointing out glaring loopholes in Britain's tax system.

When Matt Brittin of Google told the public accounts committee in November 2012 that Google did not have a sales presence in the UK, it was the news agency Reuters that quickly uncovered evidence to the contrary, resulting in Brittin being recalled in front of the committee on Thursday, where his company's behaviour was described as "devious, calculated and, in my view, unethical" by Margaret Hodge.

"You are a company that says you 'do no evil'. And I think that you do do evil," said Hodge, referring to Google's motto, "Don't be evil".

Amazon may also be recalled, after numerous whistleblowers from among its employees approached journalists to contest official accounts of its trading practices within Britain.

For the moment the government's line is that this is a global problem that cannot be solved unilaterally. On Monday, Google's executive chairman, Eric Schmidt, will meet David Cameron, a meeting No 10 insists is not about tax, but to do with Schmidt's role on the prime minister's business advisory group.

Labour leader Ed Miliband, who is due to give a speech to Google employees on Wednesday, has backed a "country by country" international scheme on tax declaration but says that he is concerned that no firm proposals have so far been put forward for the G8. "You have to have much greater transparency. Tax offices have to know country by country how much profit people are making, how much tax they are paying. Unless you know that you won't get to the bottom of what is happening. You have to deal with tax avoidance schemes. You have to deal with tax havens.

"We are saying there has to be a big, big push on this. It has to be done internationally and if it is not done internationally, Britain should act on its own."

All eyes will be on what, if anything, can be agreed at next month's G8 meeting in Scotland, where, as host of the event, David Cameron has pledged to put tax avoidance at the top of the agenda as he insists it is an issue for international co-operation rather than unilateral action.

And it would not be just the wealthy who would be watching the progress of the talks, said Melanie Ward, head of advocacy at ActionAid UK.

The art of hiding the loot

From - http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/sunday/2013-05/19/content_16509693.htm

According to the air bill on the crate that arrived at New York's Kennedy International Airportfrom London, an unnamed painting worth $100 was inside. Only later did investigators discoverthat it was by the American artist Jean-Michel Basquiat and worth $8 million.

This painting, known as "Hannibal," was brought into the United States in 2007 as part of aBrazilian embezzler's elaborate effort to launder money, the authorities say.

The painting's seizure was a victory in the economy-rattling, billion-dollar fraud and money-laundering case of Edemar Cid Ferreira, a former Brazilian banker who converted some of hisloot into a 12,000-piece art collection.

Law enforcement officials in the United States and elsewhere say "Hannibal" is just one ofthousands of valuable works of art being used by criminals to hide illicit profits and illegallytransfer assets around the globe. As other traditional money-laundering techniques have comeunder scrutiny, smugglers, drug traffickers, arms dealers and the like have increasingly turnedto the opaque art market, officials say.

The Basel Institute on Governance, a nonprofit research organization in Switzerland, warnedlast year of the high volume of illegal and suspicious transactions involving art.

It is hard to imagine a business more custom-made for money laundering, with million-dollarsales conducted in secrecy and with virtually no oversight. What this means in practical terms isthat "you can have a transaction where the seller is listed as 'private collection' and the buyer islisted as 'private collection,'" said Sharon Cohen Levin, chief of the asset forfeiture unit of theUnited States attorney's office in Manhattan. "In any other business, no one would be able toget away with this."

Governments around the world have taken steps to bring illegal activity to light. In February, forinstance, the European Commission passed rules requiring galleries to report anyone whopays for a work with more than 7,500 euros in cash, and to file suspicious-transaction reports.

The United States similarly requires all cashtransactions of $10,000 or more to be reported.

In a forthcoming book, "Money Laundering ThroughArt," the Brazilian judge who presided over theFerreira case, Fausto Martin De Sanctis, argues formore regulation, saying if businesses like casinos andgem dealers must report suspicious financial activity,so should art dealers and auction houses.

But to dealers and their clients, secrecy is crucial tothe art market's mystique and practice. The ArtDealers Association of America dismissed the ideathat using art to launder money was even a problem.

In Newark, New Jersey, federal prosecutors in a civilcase recently announced the seizure of nearly $16million in fine art photographs as part of a fraud andmoney laundering scheme that prosecutors say wasengineered by Philip Rivkin, a Texas businessman.

Mr. Rivkin, who has not been charged with any crimes,was last thought to be in Spain and had arranged to have the photos shipped there.

In New York, victims of the scams of the disbarred lawyer Marc Dreier are still in court fightingover art he bought with some of the $700 million stolen from hedge funds and investors. At themoment 28 works by artists like Matisse, Warhol, Rothko and Damien Hirst are being held bythe federal government.

"Hannibal" also sits in storage. That 1982 Basquiat work was part of a spectacular collectionthat Mr. Ferreira assembled while he controlled Banco Santos in Brazil.

In 2004 Mr. Ferreira's financial empire, built partly on embezzled funds, collapsed, leaving $1billion in debts. A court in Sao Paulo sentenced him in 2006 to 21 years in prison for bankfraud, tax evasion and money laundering, a conviction he is appealing. Before his arrest,however, art worth more than $30 million, owned by Mr. Ferreira and his wife, Marcia, wassmuggled out of Brazil, Judge De Sanctis said.

According to court papers, "Hannibal" was bought for $1 million in 2004 by a Panamaniancompany called Broadening-Info Enterprises, which later tried to sell the painting for $5 million.It was sent to New York in 2007, passing through the hands of four shipping agents in twocountries before landing at Kennedy International.

Since merchandise valued at less than $200 may enter the United States without customsdocumentation, duty or tax, "Hannibal," labeled as worth $100, was cleared for entry before theplane landed.

Philip Byler, Broadening's lawyer in New York, said the inaccurate invoices were just ashortsighted attempt by the art dealer that Broadening hired to save importation fees. "It wasnot done with the intention of smuggling," he said. He also challenged the Brazilian authorities'claim, saying that "Hannibal" was legally purchased from a company owned by Mr. Ferreira'swife.

Mr. Byler said that Broadening intends to appeal the forfeiture.

Amazon paid £3m tax on £4bn UK sales

From: http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2013/may/15/amazon-uk-tax-3m

Online retailer's tax charge brings to £6m the total corporation tax raised from Amazon.co.uk in a decade

Amazon.co.uk paid £3m in tax. Photograph: Chris Radburn/PA

Amazon's main UK subsidiary paid just £3.2m in tax last year, according to accounts filed on Wednesday, despite overall UK sales of £4.2bn.

Amazon's taxes for last year are only marginally higher than the £2.5m the company received in government grants during the year, according to the annual accounts published at Companies House.

The revelation comes amid public unrest over the minimal contribution of Amazon and fellow digital giants Apple and Google to the British public purse, despite the important contribution UK sales make to their international revenues.

The online retailer's tax charge brings to £6m the total corporation tax raised from Amazon.co.uk Limited in a decade. The company's tax bill was £1.9m in 2011, but these sums may not actually be paid to HM Revenue and Customs because of cumulative losses across the Amazon group.

Amazon employed 4,191 people at the end of 2012 in the UK, and thousands more in its warehouses via contracting agencies, but reduced payments to the British government by routing sales via a subsidiary in Luxembourg.

The UK company declared a turnover of £320m for 2012, up 50% on 2011. However, its income is largely raised from other Amazon companies in return for services such as warehousing and distribution and negotiating purchasing deals with book publishers.

Amazon gives a fuller picture of its UK revenues on regulatory filings to US investors, and this data showed a growth in UK turnover of 20% during 2012, to $6.5bn (£4.2bn).

The company's UK filing states: the company recorded a profit before taxation of £10.8m in the current year and "is expected to remain profitable for the foreseeable future".

Liberal Democrat MP John Hemming said the figures showed the inadequacy of existing rules to tackle the problem of profit shifting by major corporations.

"The government clearly needs to do a detailed study on how to handle the tax implications of e-commerce," he told Reuters.

Nick Smith, a Labour MP, said he wanted the tax authorities to take a close look at Amazon, describing its tax payment as "pathetic".

"HMRC should be going through this company's tax arrangements with a fine-tooth comb," he said.

Kofi Annan turns up heat on ENRC and Glencore in pursuit of Africa’s lost tax

From: http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/business/industries/naturalresources/article3760812.ece

Kofi Annan has called on Britain to use its presidency of the G8 to stamp out the “unconscionable” business practices of companies such as Glencore Xstrata and ENRC in Africa.

The Africa Progress Panel, chaired by the former Secretary-General of the United Nations, wants an international crackdown on tax avoidance with a particular push for transparency in the mining and oil sector, it said in a report.

ENRC and Glencore strongly deny any wrongdoing and said that they were not contacted by the Africa Progress Panel before the publication of its report. The panel estimates that Africa lost $63 billion (£40 billion) in tax revenues through illicit practices between 2008 and 2010 alone.

“It is unconscionable that some companies, often supported by dishonest officials, are using unethical tax avoidance, transfer pricing and anonymous company ownership to maximise their profits, while millions of Africans go without adequate nutrition, health and education,” the report said.

It highlights recent deals by ENRC, the miner being investigated by the Serious Fraud Office for “fraud, bribery and corruption”, and Glencore Xstrata in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

The report claims that assets were undervalued, costing the country an estimated $1.4 billion, a figure close to 10 per cent of its GDP.

The panel counts prominent executives and policymakers among its members, including Tidjane Thiam, the chief executive of Prudential, Robert Rubin, the former US Treasury Secretary, and Michel Camdessus, the former managing director of the IMF. Its donors include the UK Department for International Development and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

The panel’s criticism could focus the spotlight on Britain’s regulatory regime. Kevin Watkins, author of the report, asked why it had taken British authorities so long to investigate ENRC’s dealings in the DRC.

“We call on the G8 and the G20 to step up to the mark to show leadership,” the report read.

Fake bomb detector salesman sentenced to 10 years

From: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/may/02/iraq-military

An Old Bailey judge sentenced Jim McCormick, 57, to 10 years in jail on Thursday for a fraud he described as the worst he could imagine and "a callous confidence trick".

The survivors of lethal Baghdad truck bombs driven through checkpoints equipped with fake bomb detectors are to lay claim to at least £7m of the assets of the Somerset fraudster who sold them.

Now a list of around 200 people either injured or related to the 95 killed in a double bombing on the Iraqi ministries of justice and foreign affairs in 2009 will be presented to the UK authorities.

McCormick sold 7,000 fake bomb detectors based on useless golf ball finders to the Iraqi government and other international agencies for prices ranging from £1,600 per unit to £19,000.

They cost McCormick less than $50 (£32) and police believe sales toIraq alone were worth more than £55m, buying McCormick a mansion in Bath, holiday homes abroad and a yacht.

Judge Richard Hone told McCormick: "Your fraudulent conduct in selling so many useless devices for simply enormous profit promoted a false sense of security and in all probability materially contributed to causing death and injury to innocent individuals."

An adviser to Nouri al-Maliki, the Iraqi prime minister, said he intends to make a claim on behalf of the victims of the 2009 attack which the Old Bailey heard on Thursday was an example of McCormick's fraud contributing to terrorists' success.

"A list of those who died and were injured and their kin is already available and I will bring that list to London and provide it to the British government," said Saad al-Muttalibi, a city councillor in Baghdad.

"This money should be paid to the people who can prove they were victims of terrorism. These bomb detectors became the main deterrent in Iraq."

Brigadier Simon Marriner, who served in Iraq from 2009-2011, had told the court in a statement that McCormick's ADE-brand machines were used at checkpoints across Baghdad through which truck bombs had to pass before blowing up the ministries of justice and foreign affairs.

"These checkpoints were equipped with the ADE," he said. "The truck bomb attacks were very successful in causing significant loss of life and considerable material damage which remains to this day."

Outside court Iraqi exiles called for compensation from at least £7m in assets that are expected to be confiscated from McCormick, from Langport, Somerset.

"He destroyed Iraqi lives," said Nidhal Ailshbib, an Iraqi activist based in London. "Thousands of Iraqi people are dead and handicapped."

DS Steve Mapp, of Avon and Somerset police, urged people who believe they were victims of the bomb detectors to make a claim for compensation from the confiscation hearing scheduled for May 2014.

"We can invite them to come forward to be considered to be compensated for their loss," he said. "That is something we are considering and it is only right."

Richard Whittam QC, defending, said: 

We pay £6m tax on £2.6bn UK profits, but that's OK because we help start-ups: Google

From the Independent: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/we-pay-6m-tax-on-26bn-uk-profits-but-thats-ok-because-we-help-startups-google-boss-eric-schmidt-under-fire-over-comments-on-corporate-tax-8582605.html

Senior MPs called on David Cameron to consider stripping the boss of Google from his role as a government adviser tonight after he suggested that his company’s contribution to the British economy was more important than paying its fair share of tax.

Politicians from all three parties rounded on Google’s executive chairman, Eric Schmidt, after he defended its use of loopholes to minimise its UK tax bill. He insisted that Google would comply only with the letter of the law – despite paying only £6m of taxes on £2.6bn of revenue generated in the  UK in 2011. Google uses anomalies in international law to move profits into low-tax jurisdictions even if they have been generated by business carried out in Britain. Chancellor George Osborne has made tackling the practice a priority for Britain’s chairmanship of the G8.

But in an interview with the BBC, Mr Schmidt defended his company’s practice, suggesting that its contribution to the UK economy was more important than the tax it paid to the Exchequer. “We are investing heavily in Britain,” he said. “We power literally billions of pounds of start-ups through advertising networks and so forth, and we’re a key part of the electronic commerce expansion of Britain, which is driving a lot of economic growth for the country. So from our perspective, I think, you have to look at it in a totality.

“The people we employ in Britain are certainly paying British taxes, and more importantly, they’re British citizens and they’re driving a lot of GDP. I think the most important thing to say about our taxes is that we fully comply with the law, and well, obviously, should the law change we’ll comply with that as well.”

His comments were condemned by MPs, who pointed out that much of the investment in broadband internet infrastructure that had allowed Google to grow had been paid for by taxpayers.

Margaret Hodge, the chairman of the powerful Commons Public Accounts Committee (PAC), which carried out an investigation into the tax practices of multinational companies, said the Government should consider whether Mr Schmidt was an appropriate person to remain on its Business Advisory Group if Google maintained its tax position. “I think we should be careful who we talk to, and I think if people want to have the voice of Government, they have a responsibility to pay their fair share,” she said.

A government source also questioned Mr Schmidt’s position, claiming Google was “not really investing very much in Britain” and that the company had a “disproportionate influence” on Mr Cameron. “It’s a bit like The Wizard of Oz,” the source said. “From the outside, they appear terribly important and powerful but, when you look closely at what they are actually investing in Britain, it is pretty insubstantial.”

France's President Hollande: Eradicate tax havens

From - http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-22094194

French President Francois Hollande has called for "eradication" of the world's tax havens and told French banks they must declare all of their subsidiaries.

He was speaking after presenting a draft law aimed at "moralising" French public life - a response to the tax scandal that has shaken his presidency.

France's ex-Budget Minister Jerome Cahuzac has been charged with fraud over a secret Swiss bank account.

Mr Hollande said a new central agency would fight fraud and corruption.

Earlier the French Socialist government set a deadline of 15 April for ministers to declare their assets, as part of the new transparency drive.

Mr Cahuzac admitted last week that he had hidden about 600,000 euros (£509,000; $770,000) in a Swiss bank account, causing shock in France. He has now been expelled from the Socialist Party for lying about his financial affairs.

Addressing a news conference on Wednesday, Mr Hollande said "tax havens must be eradicated in Europe and worldwide".

"I won't hesitate to consider as a tax haven any country that refuses to co-operate fully with France."

He said French banks "will have to publish every year the full list of their subsidiaries in the world, country by country". They will also have to explain their business, he said.

"In other words it won't be possible for a bank to hide transactions carried out in a tax haven."

===============================================================

Will work if only other major countries do the same.  Will they?

Horsemeat scandal: Dutch uncover large-scale meat fraud

From - http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-22098763

Some 50,000 tonnes of meat supplied by two Dutch trading companies and sold as beef across Europe since January 2011 may have contained horsemeat.

The meat is being recalled where possible, the Dutch authorities say.

There was no evidence that the meat was a threat to human health, the Netherlands Food and Consumer Product Safety Authority said.

In total, 132 companies in the Netherlands and some 370 more around Europe are affected by the discovery.

The suspect meat was supplied by Wiljo Import en Export BV and Vleesgroothandel Willy Selten.

The two companies are owned by one man who has already previously been investigated by food safety officials, the BBC's Matthew Price reports.

The latest find was made as part of EU-wide tests to trace horse DNA in processed beef foods and to detect a veterinary drug used on horses.

=================================================================

Are there no honest people left in the world?

British police make £20 million from personal injury claims

From - http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/law-and-order/9964617/Police-make-20-million-from-personal-injury-claims.html

The officers are using “ambulance chasing” lawyers to sue over accidents which happen whilst they are on duty – including falls and animal attacks.

There is even a hotline run by the Police Federation which is encouraging the practice. A lot of the £42million paid out in the last two years has been taxpayer funded.

The revelations come as public anger grows over the case of PC Kelly Jones, who is seeking damages from petrol station owner Steve Jones after reportedly tripping on a curb whilst attending a suspected break-in.

Mr Jones and the officer were checking the outside of the building after an alarm had gone off, when PC Jones is alleged to have fallen and injured herself.

Mr Jones has now received a letter from her solicitor claiming he is at fault after she suffered an injury to her leg and wrist and attended hospital, although she had been well enough to continue searching.

Mr Jones, 50, said he was "dismayed" to have received the letter seven months after the incident on August 25 last year.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Now that the 'cat's out of the bag', the British fire fighters and ambulance crew and maybe lots of others willbe  making similar claims - if they haven't done so already.

Documentary: Inside Job

Charles Ferguson’s film – Inside Job – won the Academy Award for Best Documentary in 2011. It narrates the conflicts of interest between the finance industry, politicians, academics and regulators, which eventually led to the trillion-dollar collapse of 2008. Narrated by Matt Damon. From: http://www.theotherschoolofeconomics.org/?p=2499 - which screens the film on-line.

This documentary exposes the facts behind the 2008 global economic disaster. It was triggered by derivatives, primarily based on sub-prime mortgages in the US.  But the roots go back to the Regan deregulation of financial services. What is shocking is that many of the investment banks were betting against their own products and deliberately lying to their own customers. Several lawsuits are still pending.

It is fascinating viewing, but deeply disturbing as many of the key personalities are still in play in various companies and governments and regulatory bodies today.

For a write up see - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inside_Job_(film)

Horsemeat scandal: EU ministers want faster action on meat labelling

From - http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2013/feb/24/horsemeat-scandal-country-origin-labelling

A European Commission report on tougher rules about origins of frozen beef products is expected but not until the end of 2013

Horsemeat found in frozen beef products has destroyed the trust many people placed in their local supermarkets. Photograph: Luke Macgregor/Reuters

Owen Paterson, the environment secretary, will be among ministers from across the EU pressing on Monday for speedier action on introducing country-of-origin labelling for processed beef and other meat products as they struggle to get a grip on the horsemeat scandal.

On Saturday the French president, François Hollande, joined the growing calls for more traceability at European level and critics have complained that the UK coalition government had been dragging its feet on the issue before the crisis began last month. Country of origin and slaughter for cattle must already be included on labels for fresh and frozen beef but the European commission is paving the way to extend that to other meats and ingredients in processed food. However, a report on implementing tougher rules is not expected until the end of the year. This month, the Commons environment, food and rural affairs select committee said UK ministers had been caught "flat-footed" by the scandal, which has been blamed on mislabelling and criminal fraud, and criticised them for having sought UK exemption from some EU rules.

This would allow minced meat sold in Britain to have a higher fat and collagen content than permitted in other EU member states and remove the requirement for loose meat products to declare the amount of meat they contained. "This is not the time for the government to be proposing reducing the labelling standards applied to British food", said the committee.

Glenis Willmott, Labour MEP for the East Midlands and the party's leader in the European parliament, said last week that in 2011 UK ministers had opposed plans backed by the parliament for more comprehensive country of origin labelling. This had forced MEPs "into a much weaker compromise" as the coalition tried "to kick the issue into the long grass".

She said: "It is interesting that Mr Paterson, one of the most Eurosceptic of ministers, is now advocating EU legislation as a solution to the current crisis. It is simply common sense that a problem in the meat supply chain … needs EU-wide measures to combat it. But it is precisely this kind of EU regulation that Eurosceptics deem 'red tape from Brussels'. In 2011 the UK government said my plans would be too difficult to put into practice because the meat supply chain was too complex. We have now seen what the complexities of the industry can hide."

British sugar giant caught in global tax scandal

From The Guardian - http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2013/feb/09/british-sugar-giant-tax-scandal

One of Britain's biggest multinationals, whose brands include Silver Spoon sugar, Twinings Tea and Kingsmill bread, is avoiding paying millions of pounds of tax in an African state blighted by malnutrition, a year-long investigation revealed on Sunday.

The Zambian sugar-producing subsidiary of Associated British Foods, a FTSE100 company, contributed virtually no corporation tax to the state's exchequer between 2007 and 2012, and none at all for two of those years.

The firm, Zambia Sugar, has recently posted record pre-tax profits and its huge plantation is increasing its capacity to produce more sugar for markets in Europe and Africa. Yet it paid less than 0.5% of its $123m pre-tax profits in corporation tax between 2007 and 2012.

The company benefits from generous capital allowance and tax-relief schemes in Zambia, but the investigation also found that it funnels around a third of its pre-tax profits to sister companies in tax havens, including Ireland, Mauritius and the Netherlands. Tax treaties between Zambia and some of those countries mean the state's revenue authorities are unable to charge their normal tax on money leaving their shores.

The revelations are contained in a report published by ActionAid, which exposes how Zambia Sugar has kept its contribution to the state's exchequer so low, although the company says that globally it actually pays a higher rate of tax on its profits than it otherwise would due to its corporate structure.

It is estimated that the tax haven transactions of this one British headquartered multinational deprived Zambia of a sum 14 times larger than the UK aid provided to the country to combat hunger and food insecurity.

ActionAid's findings will heap more pressure on the chancellor, George Osborne, to make progress in closing gaps in international tax standards and tackling avoidance at the G20 meeting of world leaders this week and the G8 in June.

RBS bankers must pay Libor fine, says George Osborne

From - http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2013/feb/04/royal-bank-scotland-libor-fine-osborne

George Osborne is forcing Royal Bank of Scotland to cut its bankers' pay to ensure that taxpayers are not left to pick up the cost of the upcoming multimillion-pound fine for Libor rigging.

The chancellor said his views had been made clear to the management of the bailed-out bank in an attempt to defuse public anger about the portion of the fine – which could amount to between £400m to £500m in total – that will be paid to the US authorities.

"When it comes to RBS, I am clear that the bill for any US fine related to this investigation should on this occasion be paid for by the bankers, and not the taxpayer," Osborne said.

Speaking in Bournemouth where he unveiled plans to reform the banking system, Osborne appeared to back the RBS chief executive, Stephen Hester, but indicated he expects heads to roll as a result of the fine for rigging Libor – a key interest rate. It was "well known" that RBS was considering management changes, Osborne said.

The fine from the UK's Financial Services Authority is thought to be just under £90m with US regulators levying fines of around four times that amount. In the furore that followed the £290m Libor fine paid by Barclays last year, £59.5m of which was levied by the FSA, the law was changed to ensure that fines went to the government.

"Those who were doing the supervising must also bear their share of the responsibility," Osborne said. "The RBS board and the RBS senior management are well aware of that and decisions are in hand."

He added that Hester is "taking the action to ensure those responsible are held to account".

It is expected that the departure of John Hourican, the head of the investment bank, will be announced once the Libor fine is revealed, possibly later this week, although he is not thought to be personally implicated in the rigging of Libor. The size of the bonus pool for 2012 at RBS has yet to be disclosed. It was £390m for 2011 and is expected to fall by as much as £150m. But the call by the chancellor to ensure bankers pay for the Libor fine does not preclude bonuses being paid for 2012.

Responding to questions about why senior bankers should receive bonuses after a year of scandal, Osborne acknowledged that Hester and Barclays boss Antony Jenkins have waived their bonuses.

He said there could have been "enormous public anger" if fines levied on RBS by US regulators were paid by the taxpayer, not the bankers.

"That is not on," said Osborne, who has told the bank's management that a fine imposed by international regulators should be paid out of bankers' pay. If the fine is paid by shareholders, led by taxpayers who own 83%of the bank, "that could have been a very great source of public anger this spring," said Osborne.

The chancellor confirmed remarks by Treasury sources over the weekend which had suggested he was concerned about how the Libor fine would be paid. In his speech, Osborne insisted that "everyone should exercise restraint and responsibility" over bonuses.

Osborne was accused of "rhetoric" and a "partial climbdown" by Ed Balls, the shadow chancellor, after he said he would use legislation to threaten banks with being broken up if they attempted to flout rules requiring them to ringfence their high street and investment banking operations.

Andrew Tyrie, the Conservative MP whose banking standards commission helped create the idea of "electrifying" the ringfence, said the chancellor had taken an "important step in the right direction". The ringfence was a key plank in proposals by Sir John Vickers' independent commission but the banking standards commission had been concerned banks would try to "game" the ringfence. "They will always try to do so unless strong disincentives are put in place," said Tyrie.

Chancellor insists Royal Bank of Scotland, not UK taxpayers, must take up estimated £500m fine for Libor rigging