No To Retro Tax – Campaign Against Section 58 Finance Act 2008

[nick4notax]

totally agree

I guess that barrister only told them what was theoretically possible. How HMRC/parliament apply/communicate it is nothing to do with him I would have thought. The legal eagles are only doing their job in applying the law. They have not lied or misled I believe.

but I agree, there needs to be some serious repercussions as a result of this fiasco !

Once we've won this and our returns are finally accepted as legit, it's time to go after those who thought this nightmare up!

[Dieselpower]

Meeting with cabinet member

JUst an update from my meeting on friday: Whilst he wasnt overly commital to being for or against retrospective tax he seemed genuinely concerned when I mentioned that payments on account and challenging the schemes validity did not happen until May 2007.
I told him that David Gauke was sending out boilerplate letters stating that notice to pay on account had been given all along and he said he would take the matter up with him directly.

I said that we wanted an ammendment to S.58 so that it only acted prospectively from March 2008 and his response was along the lines of "well I dont think you will achieve that but you may have a decent case for it only applying as far back as May 2007." He asked that I forward him the May 2007 letter so that he could send it to David Gauke.

Will keep you updated...

Hi FB - have you relayed details of yr meeting to Whitehouse or to Donkey please?

[Dieselpower]

Yes it has been.

Has this enormous contradiction to gaukes boiler plate letter been pointed out to him yet?

Seems a bit of a slam dunk to me

Yes Smalldog - Gauke is acutely aware of his own contradictions.

[foolishboy]

Hi FB - have you relayed details of yr meeting to Whitehouse or to Donkey please?

Hi DP, yes have informed both.

[travellingknob]

POA

Payment on Account

Be careful what you are telling your MP.

Some people may only have been advised by HMRC to make a PoA in 2007 but that is not true for everyone, especially those who joined in the early years.

For example, HMRC's testimony to the High Court reveals that Huitson was advised to make a PoA for 2001/2 in June 2004.

Forget PoA - it's a red herring.

The key points of rebuttal to the Gauke letter are outlined in H006.

Agree, it works the other way as well. I joined scheme in 03/04, did not have an enquiry opened until Aug 07 and never told PoA until March 08.

Interestingly I also have a letter from HMRC in April 10 which states: 'Technical Exchange - Issue 63 was superseded by legislation that was included in the 2008 Finance Bill.'
Huh ? So they say what they knew all along was superseded by s58 (respectively) but still failed to open any enquiries within time limits nor advise to PoA until 2008.

[OnYourBikeGB]

Agree, it works the other way as well. I joined scheme in 03/04, did not have an enquiry opened until Aug 07 and never told PoA until March 08.

Interestingly I also have a letter from HMRC in April 10 which states: 'Technical Exchange - Issue 63 was superseded by legislation that was included in the 2008 Finance Bill.'
Huh ? So they say what they knew all along was superseded by s58 (respectively) but still failed to open any enquiries within time limits nor advise to PoA until 2008.

That's an interesting letter. They wafted away TE63 at the JR by saying that it was written by a junior officer. Your letter seems to imply that perhaps it was more important than they wanted the JR to know if they are going as far as to say that it has been superceded.

[Toocan]

Agree, it works the other way as well. I joined scheme in 03/04, did not have an enquiry opened until Aug 07 and never told PoA until March 08.

It is important to stress what The Donkey said earlier:

There is a difference between

• The suggestion “to make a Payment on Account”

and

• The statement “that the scheme did not work”

No one would make a payment on account unless they expected that they would have further tax to pay. This turned on whether the scheme worked.

HMRC did not tell anyone that they believed the scheme did not work until 16th May 2007. Even where HMRC wrote to scheme users prior to that date the never gave a clear statement as to whether the scheme achieved its purpose.

Document B015, Page 12, Paragraph 32 explains this from the horse’s mouth

Prior to 16th May 2007 HMRC were firmly on the fence in their letters – probably because they had document I007 that made it very clear that the scheme worked.

[Dieselpower]

TE63

Agree, it works the other way as well. I joined scheme in 03/04, did not have an enquiry opened until Aug 07 and never told PoA until March 08.

Interestingly I also have a letter from HMRC in April 10 which states: 'Technical Exchange - Issue 63 was superseded by legislation that was included in the 2008 Finance Bill.'
Huh ? So they say what they knew all along was superseded by s58 (respectively) but still failed to open any enquiries within time limits nor advise to PoA until 2008.

TK - pls could you let Whitehouse or Donkey have copy of that letter as soon as poss? - its sounds very very useful to me.

[ready_to_leave]

What's positive about our situation is that MPs are no stranger to the circumstances which have landed us here. There's growing concern that retrospection is creeping into govt. policy all too much. There's many MPs out there that are geuinely opposed to retrospective taxing when it comes to tax avoidance and for justifiable reasons. Another classic example...

Clause 67: 16 Jun 2009: Public Bill Committees - TheyWorkForYou

They just need to be rallied together into a majority regarding our specific case. Some will be behind us on principle anyway.
And with the growing scale of publicity thanks to the Whitehouse canpaign, it could well afford others the oppurtunity to reconsider their position 'now more [NTRT] facts have come to light'. Then it's just left to root out who perpetrated the myth. Politics is no stranger to scandal and 'straw men'.

3000 contractors get clobbered but GSK gets to kick it's tin-can of multi-million pound tax responsibilities down the road. That's fair HMRC. But if some of you face a similar 'kick' for misrepresentation then I guess that's fair as well.

I love the fact that Timms perfectly fulfils the role of socialist hypocrite by defending retrospectivity and "fair share" and has no cognitive dissonance about these measures as he states:

"They are worried that people who know exactly what they are doing and are who employ the services of highly paid advisers to devise those ingenious schemes are, by that route, avoiding paying tax like the rest of us."

while at the same time using a combination of a charitable arms-length trust and a trust fund for his children to hold his 3.7% stake in Ovum.

House of Commons - Standards and Privileges - Sixth Report

[travellingknob]

TK - pls could you let Whitehouse or Donkey have copy of that letter as soon as poss? - its sounds very very useful to me.

Will send to DR when i get chance to scan