You're havin' a Giraffe !!!! - Zero Tax Bill For UK Big Six !!!!!!

Zero Tax Bill For UK Big Six

IT'S ONE RULE FOR ONE !!!

AT LEAST six of Britain’s 10 biggest multinationals — including Shell, British American Tobacco (BAT) and Lloyds Banking Group — paid no UK corporation tax in 2014 despite combined global profits of more than £30bn.

The disclosure comes as the Tories are embroiled in a row over a deal with Google that allowed it to pay just £130m in corporation tax since 2005.

The other companies that paid no UK corporation tax in 2014 were Lloyds, brewer SABMiller and drugs company AstraZeneca. BP and drugs company Glaxo Smith Kline (GSK) declined to reveal how much UK corporation tax they paid, though GSK said it paid some. HSBC and drinks group Diageo paid £238m between them on combined profits of more than £14bn. The oil giant Shell is just one of the multinationals with an outpost in Zug, a Swiss canton with rock-bottom tax rates. From there, it licenses its trademarks around the world. Shell Brands International (SBI) is one of the hubs in the multinational’s vast corporate labyrinth, which spans the world from major cities to tax havens such as Bermuda and which can be used to reduce tax payments.

This structure can help cut tax bills. It emerged this weekend that Shell paid no UK corporation tax in 2014, despite racking up global profits of £19.87bn.

DAYLIGHT ROBBERY A MAJOR SUCCESS : "That all went rather well , I've still got my shirt !"

An investigation by The Sunday Times also reveals:

• British American Tobacco (BAT) made global profits of £4.55bn in 2014. It paid £1.4bn in corporation tax around the world, but not a penny in Britain — despite profits on its UK cigarette business

• Vodafone, which has faced criticism over its use of a Luxembourg entity to reduce tax bills, made £1.97bn of profits in the year to March 31, 2015. It confirmed this weekend that it paid no UK corporation tax in 2014/15

• AstraZeneca, a pharmaceutical company employing 6,700 people in the UK, said it paid no UK corporation tax in 2014 because there were no taxable profits

The details of the scant UK corporation tax paid by some of Britain’s biggest companies will raise new questions over the effectiveness of the corporation tax regime in Britain. HM Revenue & Customs was last week accused of a “sweetheart deal” with Google over a £130m tax payment dating back to 2005. George Osborne, the chancellor, said last night that he wanted an international deal to ensure multinationals reveal how much tax they pay in each country.

The 10 most valuable firms on the London Stock Exchange analysed by this newspaper, using the latest available financial accounts and transparency disclosures, all have their global headquarters in Britain, apart from Shell which had its head offices in the Netherlands.

Out of the 10 top companies on the London Stock Exchange, six confirmed they had paid no UK corporation tax in the period covered by their latest annual accounts — 2014 or 2014/15.

Two firms — HSBC and the drinks giant Diageo — provided details of the UK corporation tax they paid. Two others — Glaxo Smith Kline (GSK) and BP — would not disclose how much they paid.

The multinationals say they have contributed billions of pounds in other taxes or levies. They are also paying billions of pounds of corporation tax in foreign countries.

Richard Brooks, a journalist for Private Eye magazine and author of The Great Tax Robbery, who has exposed the low UK corporation tax paid by some multinationals, said: “UK corporate tax laws have been grossly skewed in favour of large multinationals. Tax reliefs can be so disproportionate that UK taxable profits vanish.”

Shell said it was not paying UK corporation tax because of tax relief on £1.4bn of investments in the North Sea, and because of declining production.

It said it made a loss in the UK in 2014 and confirmed Shell UK paid royalties to SBI in Switzerland, but that this accounted for less than 2.5% of SBI’s income. A spokesman said its overall global effective tax rate was about 48% and it was transparent about the management of its tax affairs.

BP, which made £3.48bn of profits in 2014, said it was paying for a £10bn programme of investment in the UK and “does not expect to be paying corporation tax in the UK until there is a recovery in the oil price”.

It would not disclose the amount of UK corporation tax it paid in 2014, but the annual accounts of four main UK operating subsidiaries show no UK corporation tax charge.

BAT, which sold 667bn cigarettes in 2014, said it paid corporation tax at a worldwide rate of about 30%, but none in the UK in 2014. It said UK business accounted for just 1% of global revenues, and that once research and employees’ costs were taken into account, there was no taxable profit.

The brewing giant SABMiller, based in London, which made global profits of about £3.4bn in the year to March 31, 2015, said it also paid no UK corporation tax in that year for similar reasons.

Vodafone said its taxable profits in the UK were reduced largely because of interest payments on loans to fund licensing payments made to the British government, and depreciation on network investment. It said that since 2000, it had paid the government more than £7bn for communication licences.

AstraZeneca said there were no taxable profits in the UK in 2014 due to the expiring of patents and research and development costs. GSK said it paid some UK corporation tax, but declined to provide details.

Some of the big banks, which have been recovering from the financial crash, also pay little corporation tax. Lloyds Banking Group made a profit of £1.76bn in 2014, but confirmed this weekend it had paid no UK corporation tax that year because of prior losses. It said, however, that it paid about £1.7bn a year in other taxes, including VAT and national insurance.

HSBC Group, with profits of £11.3bn worldwide, said it paid about £160m in UK corporation tax in 2014. Diageo said its UK corporation tax charge for 2014/15 was £78m; in the same year it made profits of £2.93bn worldwide.

You're havin' a Giraffe !!!!