argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
Tax Avoidance and Evasion — House of Commons, 2017-11-14
Topic: Macroeconomics
Margaret Eve Hodge (Labour, Centre-left): I entirely agree. I must now make progress, because otherwise I shall take up too much time More than half of the Appleby offices are located in British tax havens. More than half of the entities that were exposed in the Panama papers were incorporated in just one UK tax haven, the British Virgin Islands. Estimates of the wealth held in tax havens are by their nature difficult to verify, but they vary from $7.6 trillion to $32 trillion.
Tax Avoidance and Evasion — House of Commons, 2017-11-14
Topic: International Affairs
Rushanara Ali (Labour, Centre-left): Does my right hon. Friend agree, in the light of what she has said, that Britain has a unique leadership role? Developing countries lose income amounting to between $100 billion and $160 billion a year. Imagine what we could do to tackle poverty if that money were available.
Tax Avoidance and Evasion — House of Commons, 2017-11-14
Topic: Macroeconomics
Grahame Mark Morris (Labour, Centre-left): Will the Minister please explain to the House why only 420 HMRC staff are engaged in chasing tax avoiders and evaders, yet 10 times that number of civil servants are engaged in addressing benefit fraud in the Department for Work and Pensions?
Tax Avoidance and Evasion — House of Commons, 2017-11-14
Topic: Macroeconomics
Caroline Louise Flint (Labour, Centre-left): The Minister is right to point out that HMRC does a very good job on the collection of tax in this country, but that does not mean it cannot do better. Does the Minister agree that the tax take is based on what we think should be paid in tax, and it does not deal with the Googles, Amazons, Starbucks and others who hide their tax away and are therefore not computed into the actual tax we should take and therefore the figures for a tax gap?
Tax Avoidance and Evasion — House of Commons, 2017-11-14
Topic: Macroeconomics
Antonia Louise Antoniazzi (Labour, Centre-left): Does the Minister agree that HMRC would serve the Government and the people of the United Kingdom better by challenging those who bend the rules rather than by fining my law-abiding constituent, Sheila, £1,600 for a £135 yearly tax bill, when all that she had failed to do was to press "enter" at the end of the form?
Tax Avoidance and Evasion — House of Commons, 2017-11-14
Topic: Government Operations
Margaret Eve Hodge (Labour, Centre-left): I will certainly join the Minister in seeking any documentation that HMRC requires to pursue those who are guilty of avoidance or evasion. I would say to him, however, that when I have given papers to HMRC in the past—whether relating to Google or from other whistleblowers—they have just disappeared and no action ever appears to have been taken.
Tax Avoidance and Evasion — House of Commons, 2017-11-14
Topic: Macroeconomics
Peter Christopher Dowd (Labour, Centre-left): I will try to take that on board as a suggestion rather than a direction, Mr Speaker. The Minister identified what he thinks should be done, but I will tell him what should be done. In our "Tax Transparency and Enforcement Programme" document, Labour calls for an immediate public inquiry into avoidance, greater scrutiny of MPs, the creation of a specialist tax enforcement unit, and the public filing of large company tax returns and of the tax returns of wealthy individuals earning more than £1 million. We want no public contracts for tax avoiders, the repatriation of contracts parked in tax havens, public contract transparency, a register of beneficial ownership of companies and a register of trusts, and our programme would be enforced by working with the banking sector. We also call for a general anti-avoidance rule in principle, strict minimum standards for crown dependencies and overseas territories, the creation of an offshore companies levy and full country-by-country reporting. All that represents a comprehensive proposal from Labour.
Tax Avoidance and Evasion — House of Commons, 2017-11-14
Topic: Macroeconomics
Peter Christopher Dowd (Labour, Centre-left): My hon. Friend makes an important point. Transparency is at the heart of all this. I experienced a bizarre situation last week when I was on "Newsnight" with the chairman of the Cayman Islands stock exchange. What an insouciant attitude that man had to tax avoidance. He actually said that there had not been any wrongdoing—maybe not—and called for the journalists to be jailed. That is what he did, and that is the position in which we find ourselves.
Tax Avoidance and Evasion — House of Commons, 2017-11-14
Topic: Macroeconomics
Peter Christopher Dowd (Labour, Centre-left): I am going to take Mr Speaker’s suggestion and push on, because it will become an admonition otherwise. I will then take some interventions I hope that Members across the House will join me in condemning the irresponsible and offensive comments of the chairman of the Cayman Islands stock exchange. All of us owe a debt of gratitude to the journalists involved for their hard work and diligence. They have demonstrated the importance of a free press in holding the wealthiest and most powerful individuals and multinationals to account To be clear, we are talking about tax avoidance that covers activities that are within the law but work against its effective application. Most of the people involved in the cases have not broken any laws or acted in a criminal way, but that does not make tax avoidance acceptable or justifiable in the 21st century. After all, as has been identified, tax avoidance costs us all. Every pound avoided is one pound taken away from our children’s education, from our armed forces—the very people who protect us—and from the elderly and disabled. The conservative—and Conservative—figures that the Government have published on tax avoidance show that HMRC recorded from 2010-2015 that £12.8 billion was lost to the Exchequer through tax avoidance. That is unacceptable People have a view about what the previous Labour Government did. They think that it was much better than the Tories overall, but I am not going to go there. The question arises—[Interruption.] I refer the hon. Member for Rochford and Southend East (James Duddridge) to the Financial Times. With the greatest of respect, I am not his researcher, and I am sure he is more than capable.
Tax Avoidance and Evasion — House of Commons, 2017-11-14
Topic: Macroeconomics
Peter Christopher Dowd (Labour, Centre-left): My hon. Friend the Member for St Helens South and Whiston (Ms Rimmer) says, "Move on." and I think she is absolutely right. I will reaffirm the point that was made in Labour’s tax programme document: we have to push on with this debate. It does no good for the Government to talk about the past; we want to talk about the here and now and the future.
Tax Avoidance and Evasion — House of Commons, 2017-11-14
Topic: Macroeconomics
Peter Christopher Dowd (Labour, Centre-left): You are looking at me with those eyes and with a smile, Mr Speaker, so I will move on While tax avoidance is a global problem, it is also a UK problem. The UK accounts for 17% of the global market for offshore services. We are considered one of the biggest—if not the biggest—players in the global offshore system of tax havens. We account for some of the world’s key tax havens, including Jersey, Guernsey, Isle of Man, Bahamas, British Virgin Islands, Cayman Islands, Bermuda and the Turks and Caicos Islands, all of which are either Crown dependencies or British overseas territories and all of which are afforded the support and the protection of the British Government. Despite our prominence as a country at the heart of a network of offshore tax havens that aids and abets tax avoidance across the globe, the Government refuse to lead the way in global tax transparency. I keep on using that word "transparency" and I will keep on doing so.
Tax Avoidance and Evasion — House of Commons, 2017-11-14
Topic: Government Operations
Michael Lee Amesbury (Labour, Centre-left): Does my hon. Friend agree that the purchasing of a private jet at nearly £17 million and then setting up an offshore leasing company with the sole aim of saving £3 million in VAT is an affront to our public services?
Tax Avoidance and Evasion — House of Commons, 2017-11-14
Topic: Macroeconomics
Peter Christopher Dowd (Labour, Centre-left): My hon. Friend is quite right. That is shocking Government Members’ denial about their record on tax avoidance is not new. In 2013, while the G8 was pushing ahead with stricter rules that would clamp down on tax avoidance, the then Conservative Prime Minister, David Cameron, was busy undermining them, writing to the President of the European Council demanding that offshore trusts were excluded. The Government’s record on tackling tax avoidance is not all that they would like it to be.
Tax Avoidance and Evasion — House of Commons, 2017-11-14
Topic: Macroeconomics
Peter Christopher Dowd (Labour, Centre-left): I am more than happy to give the hon. Gentleman the narrative of the wash-up proceedings. If he wants, I am happy to talk to him outside, because the information that he has been getting from his Front-Bench team is nonsense I am going to conclude to give others the opportunity to speak. First we had the Panama papers and now we have the Paradise papers; how many more tax avoidance leaks will there need to be before the Government act? It is clear that we desperately need a public inquiry into tax avoidance and the use of offshore trusts and tax havens. The Government should listen to the Opposition and, perhaps more importantly, to people outside the House and act by introducing a public register of offshore trusts and publishing the information already provided from overseas territories. They should also stop cuts to HMRC and ensure that HMRC has the staff and resources it needs to tackle tax avoidance at its core If the Government continue to ignore the problem and fail to act, I reassure the House that a Labour Government will act.
Tax Avoidance and Evasion — House of Commons, 2017-11-14
Topic: International Affairs
Wesley Paul William Streeting (Labour, Centre-left): The right hon. Gentleman will know from his considerable expertise on international development that the abuse of such offshore schemes not only harms British taxpayers but disadvantages some of the world’s poorest people. That is why the Government must act to introduce greater transparency in Crown dependencies and overseas territories.
Tax Avoidance and Evasion — House of Commons, 2017-11-14
Topic: Macroeconomics
Margaret Olivia Hillier (Labour, Centre-left): Having listened to the hon. Member for Morecambe and Lunesdale (David Morris), I am dismayed. What we are talking about is openness and transparency about tax. The right hon. Member for Sutton Coldfield (Mr Mitchell) set the tone for this debate, along with my right hon. Friend the Member for Barking (Dame Margaret Hodge). This is an important cross-party issue, and I agree with nearly every word—in fact, every word—that the right hon. Gentleman said. Tax avoidance and evasion harms countries around the world, including developing countries. It hits taxpayers in our constituencies because the wealthiest people and large corporations find ways to reduce their tax bills or to avoid paying tax completely.
Tax Avoidance and Evasion — House of Commons, 2017-11-14
Topic: Government Operations
Grahame Mark Morris (Labour, Centre-left): Is it not the case that the problem lies in our tactics of applying these complicated rules and regulations and in the fact that expensive minds—the accountants—can devise a way around them? Should we not be looking at a general principle, because people cannot get around a principle?
Tax Avoidance and Evasion — House of Commons, 2017-11-14
Topic: Government Operations
Rupa Asha Huq (Labour, Centre-left): The right hon. Gentleman mentioned David Cameron. Does he agree that much was promised after the flourish of the anti-corruption summit in May 2016—how long ago it all feels—and none of it seems to have been delivered. The anti-corruption champion, Eric Pickles, stood down and it seems that the Government have completely forgotten that the post existed at all. We were promised a strategy in 2016, but we are now being told that that will be in 2018.
Tax Avoidance and Evasion — House of Commons, 2017-11-14
Topic: Macroeconomics
Stella Judith Creasy (Labour, Centre-left): May I start by joining Members on both sides of the House who have congratulated my right hon. Friend the Member for Barking (Dame Margaret Hodge) on bringing this important debate? I also congratulate all the journalists involved in this investigation. In my short contribution, I hope I might elicit from the Minister a modicum of regret for some of his recent actions. What we need to talk about today is tax avoidance, and, if I can, I want to take on the challenge put forward by the hon. Member for Morecambe and Lunesdale (David Morris). What precisely is the issue with these offshore companies? More specifically, why would anybody hold UK property and UK entities overseas When we look at those questions, these papers raise two clear issues for us. First and foremost, there is the case for transparency, and I want to use the example of private finance initiative companies to show why that is a problem. Secondly, there is the case for addressing the loopholes that this evidence has highlighted for us, which the hon. Member for Amber Valley (Nigel Mills) set out.
Tax Avoidance and Evasion — House of Commons, 2017-11-14
Topic: Macroeconomics
Stella Judith Creasy (Labour, Centre-left): Absolutely, and I concur with all those who have raised that We can take action in this House. Specifically, new clause 2 to the Finance Bill—as my right hon. Friend the Member for Don Valley (Caroline Flint) said, many of us brought forward proposals—looked at the tax loophole relating to capital gains tax on commercial property. I will take no lectures from Conservative Members about how wonderfully this Government are doing on tax avoidance, when, just two weeks ago, they voted down a measure that would have brought in £6 billion a year to our Exchequer and given British businesses a level playing field. The Paradise papers show exactly why there is a problem, and I have mentioned £66 billion of capital gains tax and stamp duty that we are not getting because companies are registered overseas Nor will I take lectures from the Minister about loans, given that he passed in the Finance Bill a measure to reduce the share relief that PFI companies can claim on their loans. Those companies own millions of pounds’-worth of our public sector, and are able to trade off the interest that they pay on those loans in overseas companies, but the Minister has just passed an amendment that will make sure they do not even have to pay any tax on that. Those companies can comfortably be held overseas so that we will not even see what is happening In the minute I have left, therefore, I want to make some simple proposals. As my hon. Friend the Member for Enfield, Southgate (Bambos Charalambous) said, we absolutely need a public register. However, we also need a moratorium on all public investment in these companies until we know precisely what tax we are missing, and until we can be confident that these offshore companies are not milking the British taxpayer twice—by not paying their taxes and by getting us to pay them through PFI and public infrastructure investments. We must also close the loophole on capital gains tax on commercial properties as a matter of urgency. Nobody who faces cuts in their public services can allow that to continue for a second longer Finally, we need to rethink the decision to give PFI companies the tax relief that the Government have just given them. I hope the Minister regrets his actions, because, frankly, this is not about the Paradise papers; it is about parasites bleeding money from our public sector.
Tax Avoidance and Evasion — House of Commons, 2017-11-14
Topic: Macroeconomics
Margaret Eve Hodge (Labour, Centre-left): I am grateful to you, Mr Speaker, for allowing this debate, and to all Members who have participated, particularly those who looked beyond narrow political party interest and more at the public interest We cannot allow the serious issues raised by the Paradise papers today simply to become the fish and chips wrappers of tomorrow. It is our responsibility as lawmakers to do all that we can, in the UK and with our international partners, to stamp out an injustice that is both unfair and offensive. The Government can take action that will make a difference, and it simply needs a strong political will to make that happen. I urge the Government to act in next week’s Budget Question put and agreed to. Resolved, That this House has considered the systemic issues enabling tax avoidance and evasion uncovered by the Paradise Papers.
European Union (Withdrawal) Bill — House of Commons, 2017-11-14
Topic: International Affairs
Frank Field (Labour, Centre-left): I rise to speak to the new clause in my name and all the other names that still remain on the amendment paper. Although I am limited to speaking to new clause 49, it is linked to new clauses 50, 51 and 52, for reasons that I will develop I wish to begin by declaring my sentiments in tabling this new clause and supporting the new clauses that are umbilically attached to it. I am a reluctant Brexiteer. I am too old to feel that I was born to bring us out of Europe, and I have not had one of those evangelical revivals in thinking that somehow life began again once we entered the Common Market and that my aim, purpose, being, and everything I breathed was towards getting us out of that organisation. That is not so In my own constituency and in the small amount of work I did nationally, I stressed that things were on a balance: we had to make a decision about Europe. We did not need more facts about Europe, but had to draw on our very natures—all that we had been taught in our culture and where, in our very being, we felt we stood in this country—to make the decision about whether we wished to leave or not.
European Union (Withdrawal) Bill — House of Commons, 2017-11-14
Topic: International Affairs
Christopher Paul Farrelly (Labour, Centre-left): On a point of order, Mr Hoyle. In this new clause we are debating an exit date of 30 March 2019, yet grouped with it there are Government amendments to be voted on at a later date that put the exit date at 11 pm on 29 March 2019. There is a difference of an hour, and as far as I am aware the clocks only go forward on Sunday 31 March. Could you give some guidance to the movers of these amendments so that the arch-Brexiteers on both sides get their clocks and house in order?
European Union (Withdrawal) Bill — House of Commons, 2017-11-14
Topic: International Affairs
Frank Field (Labour, Centre-left): That was a good intervention. My new clause decides on British time when to leave, whereas the Government’s amendments are at the beckoning of Europeans. We have a very clear choice. I will willingly take interventions that are trying to trip me up in making this short contribution I fought the referendum campaign, as much as I could, as a reluctant Brexiteer. On balance, I thought that our country’s future would increasingly thrive outside rather than inside the European Union. I have always wanted to make a deal, although it is immensely sensible, in any negotiations, to make sure that the other side knows that one may be banking on and planning for no deal The next factor—I will touch on this again when we think of what the House of Lords might do to a Bill of this size—is that it has been very difficult for most of us to come to terms with what our role has been as MPs in a representative democracy, and with how we digest the fact that a referendum has taken place and the British people have spoken. How do we react in those circumstances, which I believe are unique and in no way comparable with any other parliamentary procedure that we deal with in this House As I said at the beginning, before I was helpfully interrupted, this new clause stands with three other new clauses. Together they present the Government with a clean, small, slimline Brexit Bill. By the time we get to the end of this process, they will thank the Lord that this life raft is in the Bill and they are able to get on it. In the new clause, we decide on the date—by British time, not European time—when we actually leave. That is our choice. It is about the beginnings of the freedom that we hope will flow—with difficulties, of course—from setting us on the course of leaving the European Union The second new clause simply ensures that all the laws and regulations come on to our statute book at that point in time—British time, not European time.
European Union (Withdrawal) Bill — House of Commons, 2017-11-14
Topic: Government Operations
Frank Field (Labour, Centre-left): Can I just finish this point, and then I will willingly give way The third new clause is on how Parliament reviews those laws—those we wish to keep fully, those we wish to amend, those we wish to add to, and those we wish to kick out. It says that this House will decide how that process is done. I am sure that before we have finished our debate on this Bill in Committee, the Government will be agreeing with me on that. The Henry VIII stuff is an absurd way of going about this business, although as we get down to the mega-task of reviewing this, we may beg the Government for a touch of Henry VIII to get through a task of the size that will be before us Finally, given that we have real difficulties in completing a negotiation—
European Union (Withdrawal) Bill — House of Commons, 2017-11-14
Topic: International Affairs
Angela Christine Smith (Labour, Centre-left): Will my right hon. Friend not concede that an arbitrary date for Brexit could risk damaging the British economy if clear evidence emerges, as it already is, that hurrying Brexit may badly damage our manufacturing sector, our agricultural sector and our financial services sector?
European Union (Withdrawal) Bill — House of Commons, 2017-11-14
Topic: International Affairs
Frank Field (Labour, Centre-left): I am supported by people whose constituents largely agree with my views, not theirs. How they deal with that is not my problem. I agree that it is a difficult problem, but that does not mean to say that one should have any particular solution to it. Generally speaking, the larger the majority, the more clearly Labour voters spoke about Brexit. [Interruption.] No, that is absolutely true. I will deal with my hon. Friend’s point in a moment, but it comes down to who we think we are dealing with. Are we playing a game of cricket, or have we got people who are trying—
European Union (Withdrawal) Bill — House of Commons, 2017-11-14
Topic: International Affairs
George Edward Howarth (Labour, Centre-left): My right hon. Friend is making a case that I do not agree with, but he is doing so with his usual reasonable approach. I think he is probably right that at the moment, most people have not changed their minds. The reasons why they voted to leave are still, as far as they are concerned, unresolved, and they think that those things will be resolved by leaving. Suppose, however, that it emerges in the next 12 months that all the reasons why they voted as they did will not be realised, and that, on top of that, the economic consequences will be disastrous—what then?
European Union (Withdrawal) Bill — House of Commons, 2017-11-14
Topic: International Affairs
Frank Field (Labour, Centre-left): I have only four small sheets of paper, and it has taken me all this time to get this far. I have an answer for my right hon. Friend—[Interruption.] Indeed, it seems to me that the Labour side needs educating about where Labour voters are. If my right hon. Friend can contain himself, I will take account of that. I emphasise his wisdom in saying that we do not know where these negotiations will end up. They are fraught, particularly because we are negotiating with a group of people who do not want us to succeed because they fear what will happen in their own countries if we do.