Category Archives: Britain

Britain, G8, Google, Government, Politics

Google’s tax ploys criticised by MPs…

GOOGLE has been accused of ‘relying on deeply unconvincing arguments’ to avoid paying millions of pounds in British taxes.

The online search engine was described as ‘brazen’ for denying ‘clear evidence’ that it made millions from selling advertising in the UK, a powerful body of MPs found.

Last year, Google paid just £7.3 million in corporation tax on sales of £3 billion. Tax analysts say the figure should have been at least £200 million higher.

The shortfall deprives Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs (HMRC) of money to fund public services, leaving ordinary taxpayers in Britain to make up the difference.

Matt Brittin, former Managing Director of Google in the UK and current Vice President of the company, last year told MPs all of its sales were made from its European HQ in Dublin, and its British subsidiary was merely a ‘service company’. This allows it to pay tax in Ireland, which has a corporation tax rate of just 12.5 per cent compared with Britain’s 23 per cent.

But Google was hauled back in front of MPs last month after fresh evidence emerged UK staff were involved in selling.

In its report published this week, the Public Accounts Committee found Google’s arrangements were ‘manifestly artificial’ and ‘have no purpose other than tax to enable it to avoid UK corporation tax’.

Margaret Hodge MP, who chairs the committee, said:

… Google brazenly argued before this committee that its tax arrangements in the UK are defensible and lawful… This argument is deeply unconvincing and has been undermined by information from whistleblowers, including ex-employees of Google, who told us that UK-based staff are engaged in selling.

She previously said that, contrary to its corporate motto, Google ‘does do evil’ by avoiding taxes in the UK.

Her comments come ahead of the G8 meeting next week hosted by Britain, where global leaders will come under pressure to crack down on tax havens and tax dodging by multinational corporations.

Google openly admits using Bermuda to lower its global tax bill, and last year funnelled more than £6 billion into the offshore haven.

There were ‘clear discrepancies with the claims made to us by Mr Brittin in November 2012’, the report said. It found 70 per cent of Google’s sales involve UK staff as well as Irish workers, and its UK workers are largely paid by commission and have monthly sales targets.

Evidence also emerged of Google invoices sent out bearing British addresses, and Mr Brittin admitted ‘a lot of the aspects of selling’ did take place in the UK.

Mrs Hodge also criticised HMRC, saying:

… It is extraordinary that the department did not challenge Google over the complete mismatch between the company’s supposed structure and the substance of its activities. We could not understand how a few journalists, whistleblowers and MPs have uncovered what the department could not.

Google has said that it complies with all the tax rules in the UK, and it is politicians who make those rules. It added:

… It’s clear from this report the Public Accounts Committee wants to see international companies paying more tax where their customers are located, but that’s not how the rules operate today. We welcome the call to make the current system simpler and more transparent.

David Cameron, the British Prime Minister, said he would use the G8 summit to try to broker a deal on tax avoidance. Mr Cameron said that in a globalised world, no one country can on their own effectively stamp out either tax evasion or aggressive tax avoidance and this is exactly the sort of issue the leaders of the eight major economies should be addressing.

Conservative MP Stewart Jackson, who sits on the committee, said:

… The Government must look again at multilateral and bilateral tax protocols via the chairmanship of the G8, strengthen capacity at HMRC and look at simplified tax legislation as a matter of urgency.

Mr Jackson’s colleague, Steve Barclay MP, said there’s clear evidence Google is conducting sales operations and making astronomical profits in the UK – to suggest otherwise is plain fantasy.

A statement from the Treasury has said that the Government remains committed to creating the most competitive corporate tax system in the G20, but says this goes hand in hand with our call for strong international standards to make sure global companies, like everyone else, pay the taxes they owe.

HMRC says that, since 2010, it has collected over £23 billion in extra tax through challenging large businesses’ tax arrangements. It insists it will relentlessly pursue businesses that don’t play by the rules.

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Britain, Syria, United Nations, United States

The Syrian tinderbox as the West considers sending arms to the rebels…

PRESIDENT Barack Obama is considering arming Syrian rebels in a bid to end a civil war that is now into its third year.

There are growing concerns that President Bashar al-Assad may be gaining the upper hand in the conflict that has claimed at least 80,000 lives and displaced millions more, as government forces recently captured the strategic key town of Qusair.

Mr Assad’s forces are said to be preparing for an assault on the city of Aleppo.

A decision to approve military aid for Syria’s opposition forces could come within the next few days. US Secretary of State, John Kerry, postponed a Middle East trip to attend a Syrian summit in Washington instead.

Opposition leaders in Syria have warned the White House their rebellion could soon face devastating losses without greater support from the United States.

Syria’s precarious position in the heart of the Middle East makes the conflict extremely unpredictable.

The major stumbling block of supplying arms to rebels remains the fear that Al-Qaeda linked and other extremists fighting alongside anti-Assad militias could end up with the weapons.

Washington is still examining evidence that Assad’s forces may have used chemical weapons against the rebels – something Mr Obama has warned Assad would cross a ‘red line’ in provoking swift US military intervention.

Britain and France claim they already have substantive evidence that Assad’s forces have used low levels of the deadly nerve gas sarin in several attacks on rebels, which they have presented to the UN.

OPINION

The threat to world peace and prosperity posed by the bloody civil war in Syria is impossible to exaggerate. The shock-waves from the conflict between rival Islamic factions are spreading far beyond the country itself. The entire region is on the brink of being destabilised.

In Iraq, for example, supposedly rescued from tyranny by Allied forces in the war that ‘ended’ with American troops being withdrawn in December 2011, some 2,000 violent deaths have been recorded in the past two months alone.

In Turkey, Lebanon and Jordon, tensions are rising as hundreds of thousands of displaced refugees pour across the borders in pursuit of safe haven and refuge. Many thousands are in need of food and medical attention. The International Committee for the Red Cross (ICRC) has largely been prevented from attending the sick and dying as Assad has launched wave after wave of attacks on civilians on routes that should have been safeguarded as humanitarian corridors.

On the Golan Heights between Syria and Israel, after a 40-year ceasefire monitored by the United Nations, Austrian peacekeepers are pulling out as the area braces itself in becoming a war zone again.

In Syria, President Assad, far from being defeated, is being supported with Russian arms along with Hezbollah, the fanatically anti-Israeli terrorist group based in Lebanon.

Yet, this is the powder-keg into which President Obama is said to be on the verge of igniting a bigger flame. A decision is imminent on whether to send American arms to the beleaguered opposition forces.

Leaving aside the danger that Iran will retaliate by targeting Israel or US/UK interests in the region, the fact remains that the Syrian rebels (just like their counterparts in Libya two years ago), are riddled with factions hostile to the West – including Al-Qaeda.

Mr Obama, and the British Foreign Secretary, William Hague, speak glibly of arming only ‘vetted, moderate rebel units’. The inherent risks of doing so should not be played down with an awareness that these weapons could end up in the hands of the perpetrators of 9/11.

No one can know the way to peace in Syria, the tense geopolitical situation in the region is a cocktail of extremism and hatred. If the United States and Britain have learned anything from the West’s recent past interventions in the Middle East, they must surely realise that ramping up the violence in Syria comes with grave dangers.

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Britain, Government, Intelligence, United States

Whistleblower and ex-CIA operative breaks cover…

America’s most wanted man has broken cover to reveal why he decided to leak documents from one of the world’s most notorious spy organisations.

Edward Snowden, the former CIA worker, admitted he would be ‘made to suffer’ after triggering shockwaves across the globe by handing over top-secret files from the US National Security Agency (NSA).

The 29-year-old whistleblower, who reputedly earned £130,000 a year, exposed chilling details of how the covert agency, based in Maryland, gathers private information from people around the world –  including in Britain – using a programme called Prism.

The system gives officials easy access to data held by nine of the world’s top internet companies, including Google, Facebook, Microsoft and Skype.

Mr Snowden acted after becoming convinced the US government’s bid to harvest personal information from millions of individuals was a ‘threat to democracy’. He fears he will be kidnapped and returned to America to face espionage charges and possible life in jail.

Mr Snowden had been working at the NSA for the last four years as an employee of defence contractor Booz Allen Hamilton after working for the CIA as a technical assistant, specialising in computer security. His role allowed him access to classified material. He fled the United States after handing reporters from the Guardian Newspaper and Washington Post numerous documents from the agency’s computers.

Mr Snowden said:

… I don’t want public attention because I don’t want the story to be about me. I want it to be about what the US government is doing.

… My sole motive is to inform the public as to that which is done in their name and that which is done against them.

In shining a light on the NSA’s widening surveillance net the whistleblower has sacrificed a comfortable lifestyle because, as he says, he can’t in good conscience allow the US government to destroy privacy, internet freedom and basic liberties for people around the world with this massive surveillance machine they’re secretly building. Mr Snowden insists the spy chiefs at the NSA are intent on making every conversation and every form of behaviour in the world known to them. It is this, he says, which poses a ‘threat to democracy’. He believes this will stifle intellectual exploration and creativity, with the US government granting itself power it is not entitled to.

Mr Snowden fled to Hong Kong on May 20 because of its spirited commitment to free speech and the right of political dissent. The former UK colony, now part of China, could well resist the demands of the White House in apprehending him. However, it is possible that the Chinese government might seize him for questioning about US methods and secrets.

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