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

[javadude]

I suspect there will be a few more people leaving the country.

If my circumstances were different I'd have gone long ago.

The person who recommended the scheme to me and used it himself did exactly that a few years ago. Now living somewhere nice and warm where the law isn't that of a banana republic.

[freedomFighter2014]

The great escape

The person who recommended the scheme to me and used it himself did exactly that a few years ago. Now living somewhere nice and warm where the law isn't that of a banana republic.

Is that because the CIA ... opps HMRC couldn't find him :-)
I know that UK has a reciprocal relationship with some counties - does anyone know
which?
Or was he lucky enough to escape before this sorry mess started?

[zaphrus]

Given we all suspect that this legislation is going to cost the Exchequer in terms of lost taxes, benefits paid out, people leaving the country, and hopefully not, some unfortunate few going to prison, I think it would be useful to have some sort of site where we can log what we used to earn, what we used to pay in tax, what we are now not paying in tax, and what we are being paid in benefits or costing the taxpayer in other ways.

I think it would be a useful illustration and stark reminder to politicians of just how much income they cost the country due to their short sighted, politically motivated policy.

For example, I might add an entry for 2015 that reads
On average, I paid £25000 a year in corp tax, VAT, income tax and NI for the last 3 years. This year, I paid 0 in tax, and received 15000 in benefits, that's a net cost to the treasury of £40000.

You could also add other costs, like bankruptcy costs, rehousing costs, social costs, etc - all to illustrate how much damage the policy has caused.

If anyone leaves the country and decides to set up elsewhere, it'd be great if they contributed similar figures, but also explained their reasons for leaving the UK. That'd put pressure on political parties for another popular topic which is immigration. It's all very well Theresa May spouting about net migration, but who cares about quantity when quality is what really matter - if she has to explain that 10,000 strawberry pickers (no offence strawberry pickers, you do a great and important job) entered the country, but in their place 12,000 highly skilled IT contractors left the country, no one is going to care about a net migration figure of -2000, the furore will be over the qualitative numbers, rather than the quantitative.

[OnYourBikeGB]

I would go for 'misleading' rather than 'false', as 847 is more than 20.

I heard that Gauke thinks he's going to make more than £20 out of us. But I think he's wrong.

On a slightly more serious point, and being very impressed by the Twitter campaign, should we be setting set tags? I was thinking that this Government's approach has always been to stick a label on marginalised groups and then use it to hammer them. Should we use something that calls this into question, e.g. #WHOISTHEREALTAXCHEAT or something? I would be the first to admit, I know nothing about Twitter or hash tagging but we should start sticking labels on them. Any of you tweeters have any advice?

[speling bee]

I heard that Gauke thinks he's going to make more than £20 out of us. But I think he's wrong.

I imagine it's intended as more of a deterrent than a money raiser.

[BrilloPad]

I imagine it's intended as more of a deterrent than a money raiser.

That's a very large part of it. And part due to HMRC covering up incompetence/lying. Money is almost irrelevant.

[zaphrus]

I imagine it's intended as more of a deterrent than a money raiser.

And that's the idiot thing about the legislation - the prospective nature of it was the deterrent. The retrospective nature of it is at best a ploy to boost the coffers ahead of the next General Election, and at worst just plain vindictive. One of the other supposed motives of the legislation was to tackle the 65000 outstanding cases they have, but neither APNs nor follower notices will do anything to close existing cases unless the taxpayer settles. Followers/APNs just get the cash into HMRC's coffers, the case itself is still outstanding.

[BrilloPad]

And that's the idiot thing about the legislation - the prospective nature of it was the deterrent. The retrospective nature of it is at best a ploy to boost the coffers ahead of the next General Election, and at worst just plain vindictive. One of the other supposed motives of the legislation was to tackle the 65000 outstanding cases they have, but neither APNs nor follower notices will do anything to close existing cases unless the taxpayer settles. Followers/APNs just get the cash into HMRC's coffers, the case itself is still outstanding.

I disagree - drawing us over the coals is the deterrent. It also opens the door for further retrospective legislation whenever HMRC f**k up.

[Fireship]

In addition to the Finance Bill Committee members should we be directing BBC news, Sky news, etc, etc, to the likes of: https://www.dotas-scandal.org/gauke-...in-the-process

I was going to send to all but (being a twitter newbie) I thought others with more twitter experience may have a better suggestion before I start spamming people with tweets...

[speling bee]

And that's the idiot thing about the legislation - the prospective nature of it was the deterrent. The retrospective nature of it is at best a ploy to boost the coffers ahead of the next General Election, and at worst just plain vindictive. One of the other supposed motives of the legislation was to tackle the 65000 outstanding cases they have, but neither APNs nor follower notices will do anything to close existing cases unless the taxpayer settles. Followers/APNs just get the cash into HMRC's coffers, the case itself is still outstanding.

Forgetting the rights and wrongs, the retrospective nature is an additional deterrent. It deters against future schemes which people may be tempted into because of their declared legal status.