piebaps Posted April 6, 2020 Share Posted April 6, 2020 (edited) 9 hours ago, Derek Flint said: Not illegal last time I looked. Unlike evasion. Derek - this is something you know little about so its probably best you avoid commenting on it. This is mass marketed tax avoidance on an industrial scale. It began in 1999 with some new UK tax law (which became universally known as IR35 after the Inland Revenue press release which announced it). This created opportunities for clever lawyers and accountants to develop bespoke schemes for wealthy clients and be paid for their work by getting a slice of the tax saved. With each one having a limited number of clients, they started to look for ways to broaden their market and soon began to recruit thousands of new customers by using some blunt marketing (take home 85% etc etc). To a certain degree, many of these customers knew they were generating a tax saving and were taken in by sales talk as to the effectiveness of the arrangents. As the years rolled however HMRC began to tighten the laws and the smart customers realised that the game was up. This led the operators to develop a whole new customer base - the lower paid. These customers didn't really care about tax savings and didn't understand what they were getting into. Work was streamed to them via agencies who directed them to use schemes (on a no scheme/no work basis). Many of these people were bullied or coerced into joining and got little or no tax benefits. Any tax savings were swallowed up by the fees paid to the scheme operators which (probably) included some form of commission paid to the agency or salesman. Sir Amyas Morse undertook an independent report of UK Parliament https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/854387/Independent_Loan_Charge_Review_-_final_report.pdf Including "42% ofscheme users who have not settled had reported income of under £30,000 in 2017-18". Some cases make it to the UK courts. Here's the Hoey case Note the judge's comments " Importantly I note that Mr Hoey did not receive the full benefit of the absence of UK tax on his earnings because the fees chargeable by the various intermediaries were between 10% and 18% of his income, compared to the 1% which might be charged by a simple UK based umbrella company. A substantial part of the hoped for benefit of avoiding UK tax was therefore absorbed by the fees being charged by the promoters and facilitators of the scheme". https://library.croneri.co.uk/cch_uk/btc/2019-tc-07292 Its clear that some operators have been operating close to the edge of mis-selling (at least). Whether Mr B is within this group is unknown. A public display of his books might assist in clearing it, but we've as much chance of that happening as finding an open pub this weekend. His only redeeming feature is that he's not English. There's no special advantage for an operator to be here. Many schemes are based wholly in the UK. Others however have tentacles here, the CI, Gibraltar, Caribbean, Malta, Cyprus and Panama (plus probably many more too). In short, glibly slipping in the evasion avoidance soundbite is not enough to get or give a full understanding of how some of these shysters work. Obviously given his media profile, Mr B is probably a paragon of virtue. Finally, some of the Scheme users have taken their own lives. they've earned what they believed were legitimate earnings and have spent their income. Several years after the event they're being forced to sell their homes and posessions to make good a tax bill the salesman promised would never come. Some just can't cope. I have no sympathy to those who knew what they were doing but some of those who were conned and coerced into the schemes have given their blood for the salesman's new BMW. Edited April 6, 2020 by piebaps 2 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Derek Flint Posted April 6, 2020 Share Posted April 6, 2020 2 minutes ago, piebaps said: This created opportunities for clever lawyers and accountants to develop bespoke schemes for wealthy clients and be paid for their work by getting a slice of the tax saved. Yup. Tax avoidance. Not illegal. I know plenty about it, umbrella companies, tightening HMRC rules and ever more wily ways to weave through the thousands of pages of rules. It hasn’t been shut down - yet. At some stage, public opinion will cause it to be. But we aren’t there yet. Whether it is morally ever acceptable is another thing entirely. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PaulJ Posted April 6, 2020 Share Posted April 6, 2020 3 hours ago, Derek Flint said: As Douglas Bader said, “Rules are for the obedience of fools and the guidance of wise men.” He did indeed. I might just travel up the coast road to Ramsey via Marine Drive tomorrow at 48mph 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Derek Flint Posted April 6, 2020 Share Posted April 6, 2020 57 minutes ago, PaulJ said: He did indeed. I might just travel up the coast road to Ramsey via Marine Drive tomorrow at 48mph Surely a man cannot travel at such a speed? The air would be pressed from his lungs! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dilligaf Posted April 6, 2020 Share Posted April 6, 2020 (edited) 4 minutes ago, Derek Flint said: Surely a man cannot travel at such a speed? The air would be pressed from his lungs! Edited April 6, 2020 by dilligaf Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ďouglas Peel Posted April 6, 2020 Share Posted April 6, 2020 2 hours ago, finlo said: Today's factoid, Douglas Bader spent a couple of year's as a child living in Ramsey. No Obvious " legless in Ramsey" gags so far, but is there more to this story? 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
finlo Posted April 6, 2020 Share Posted April 6, 2020 10 minutes ago, Ďouglas Peel said: No Obvious " legless in Ramsey" gags so far, but is there more to this story? His parents abandoned him as a new born while they swaned off to India. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PaulJ Posted April 6, 2020 Share Posted April 6, 2020 22 minutes ago, Derek Flint said: Surely a man cannot travel at such a speed? The air would be pressed from his lungs! I'd attempt a brisk dash at 78kmh,but at such a furious clip the metrification would addle my already petrified mind and lead me to crash into a covid zombie 1 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Neil Down Posted April 7, 2020 Share Posted April 7, 2020 11 hours ago, Derek Flint said: Surely a man cannot travel at such a speed? The air would be pressed from his lungs! For some that's just wishful thinking... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Neil Down Posted April 7, 2020 Share Posted April 7, 2020 11 hours ago, finlo said: His parents abandoned him as a new born while they swaned off to India. Surely it would have been better to have swanned off... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wrighty Posted March 16, 2021 Share Posted March 16, 2021 Came across this yesterday - Michelle Mone getting flowers from a dwarf (apologies, person of short stature) and not realizing, picking him up like a toddler. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
prism10 Posted March 16, 2021 Share Posted March 16, 2021 3 minutes ago, wrighty said: Came across this yesterday - Michelle Mone getting flowers from a dwarf (apologies, person of short stature) and not realizing, picking him up like a toddler. Mone knew something was up as her hand got a bone. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Albert Tatlock Posted March 16, 2021 Share Posted March 16, 2021 He looks like a kid...easy mistake to make. Must be very old news though, pre-pandemic surely? 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wrighty Posted March 16, 2021 Share Posted March 16, 2021 9 minutes ago, Albert Tatlock said: He looks like a kid...easy mistake to make. Must be very old news though, pre-pandemic surely? Probably ages ago, but I only saw it yesterday, and didn’t start a new thread about it. Does that fit with the forum rules? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TerryFuchwit Posted March 17, 2021 Share Posted March 17, 2021 11 hours ago, wrighty said: Came across this yesterday - Michelle Mone getting flowers from a dwarf (apologies, person of short stature) and not realizing, picking him up like a toddler. That's ace. She's a tidy boiler too. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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