to be a bit pissed off that Gary Barlow has been involved in tax avoidance?

[grovel]

I thought he was supposed to be a national treasure?

From The Mirror:

Gary Barlow and two other Take That stars face having to pay back tens of millions of pounds in tax after a court ruled they were part of a massive tax avoidance scheme.

The singer-songwriter, Howard Donald, Mark Owen and manager Jonathan Wild poured £66million into two partnerships styled as music-industry investment schemes.

But the ventures were artificial tax shelters for the super-rich which allowed the musicians to avoid tax on about £63million from world tours and CD sales.

The Take That members are likely to be ordered to repay more than £20million to HM Revenue & Customs.

Tax judge Colin Bishopp rejected arguments that more than 50 partnerships, set up by a company called Icebreaker Management, had been set up for commercial purposes.

He said: “Icebreaker is, and was known and understood by all concerned to be, a tax avoidance scheme.

“The aim was to secure [tax] relief for members, and to inflate the scale of the relief by unnecessary borrowing.”

Our accountants are very straight and quick to point out anything that would potentially put you on hmrc's radar.

I doubt he understood the technicalities but I bet he knew it was sailing close to the wind. He hopefully had the money put aside waiting for the judgement.

Yes woe betide that once so called creatives habe had their moments in the sun that thry should be expected to cut their own cloth or go and get a job like us civilians.

Gary Barlow is cheating these services of money by his tax avoidance

When you last voluntarily wrote a cheque to HMRC for more tax than you legally had to pay, how much extra did you donate to them? Before we take you seriously, we need to know that you aren't a hypocrite who "cheats" by only paying what you legally owe.

Or we could reserve the word "cheating" for people who don't pay what they legally should. Which doesn't include any involved in tax avoidance.

Our accountants are very straight and quick to point out anything that would potentially put you on hmrc's radar.

That is what the good ones should be doing. Part of their job I should have thought.

And the judge said that they would have all known.

I bet Cameron won't be sticking the boot in as he did with Jimmy Carr.

YABU if you buy in to ANY stars 'I'm so lovely and good and squeaky clean' image...and very naive.

Then they cry out at illegal downloads! Never liked him much anyway and not surprised

I think the case in court was to s determine whether this scheme was avoidance or evasion.

No, failed avoidance is not the same thing as evasion.

Evasion is where someone deliberately sets out to break the law. It is a criminal offense.

A tax avoidance case is just the final step in a procedure to settle a dispute between HMRC and the taxpayer about how big the tax bill should be. It is perfectly possible for HMRC to be in the wrong, on this occasion they weren't.

Mrsjayy.
I think I am right in saying that 80% of tax comes from businesses not individuals, so that can potentially amount to a huge amount of tax avoidance, which would definitely have a great impact.

Far greater than you and I can imagine.

I think that we underestimate quite how many businesses and taxes are both collected and missing.

£470billion was collected in 2012.
Accountants can be inventive.

St David of Beckham has been up to it too.

I like a bit of Gary's music, but I do dislike all this tax avoidance. None of us in the real world can get away with paying our tax, so why should they?

There are people starving in this country and these massive stars are not paying their fair share!

Dont blame them to be honest.

According to this as well as the Beckhams, Bob Geldof, Gary Lineker and Anne Robinson are up to it, too!

The article thinks there are thousands of them!

hmm. Having just listened to the BBC report about it, it appears that it is not criminal what they have done.
It is an abuse of the tax system though.

[andsmile, that means that your last sentence is wrong]

avoidance - not criminal
evasion - criminal

Ah right ok so getting this straight:

He hasn't evaded tax or in fact done anything illegal?

A Tax planning agreement some of his money was a part of was challenged and found to be not within the rules and therefore HMRC is due additional tax?

Nope still don't care then, he paid what he legally owed, tried tax planning to reduce his bill and now will pay the difference as someone got it wrong.

ComposHat Sat 10-May-14 13:22:51

What I find galling is the fucking prat was exorting us to give to children in need. Maybe they'd be less children in need in the UK if he paid his fucking taxes.

Sanctimonious prick.

Totally agree Compo The hypocrisy stinks.

If GB did not generate millions in taxes by a) not working b) relocating elsewhere and paying taxes there then HMRCwould not have received so much in the first place.

He is a songwriter not a tax specialist. like I said tax planning is not illegal however some schemes push the boundaries, to say an individual is robbing service is just ignorant. It almost sounds entitled.

Yes softly just asked she yes this is whathas occurred. he tried to save some money legally.

i really think he knows what he has done he knows he should be paying taxes and he should be made to pay them i really dont buy the "other person is responsible" argument keep an eye on it simple he has lost everything once you would assume he would want to keep track this time

i don't think he is a national treasure he is a man who can sing simple as nothing more

I'm with softlysoftly on this. He hasn't evaded tax yet. If he refuses to pay the bill now coming his way, he will be worthy of our hatred, but at this stage he has just been told he has an additional tax bill to pay which he thought he wouldn't have.

2 years ago, I set up a limited company to do my job freelance. I pay less overall tax than I did as a PAYE employee but I only avoid tax within the rules - I pay myself a minimal salary then take extra in chunks as dividends as and when profits are available. I have a much lower regular monthly income than when PAYE as I need to retain money to get me through lean periods. When I do have a surplus I can then take it and pay less tax than if it were true salary. It somehow still feels a bit wrong to me, because I spent 15 years on PAYE, but it is entirely legal, just different. It's like this because I take substantially more risk of not earning by being a director than when i were an employee so the tax system takes account of that risk. GB is self-employed but earns substantially more than me so his tax affairs are more complex

Anyone who only pays what they owe and nothing more through PAYE - you are no different to GB actually as you only pay what you owe and not a penny more. It's just that the rules on PAYE are so clear as to not need a court ruling on what you need to pay.

Save your hatred for those Brits that move themselves to Monaco or offshore everything etc.

Tax avoidance schemes don't generally mean that people end up paying no tax.

They still pay tax, and a lot of it, just not the ridiculously huge amount that HMRC would take without any tax planning.

I can't see what there is to get worked up about tbh.

Cant help but think there would be a lot less support on this thread for someone who had made a mistake with their Housing Benefit.

This news about GB does not surprise me in the least. He has made no secret of his admiration of Thatcher

I don't like hypocrites And hypocrisy is usually part of the package with a Tory.

Housing benefit is not related to tax.

I wouldn't have a problem with somebody who made a genuine mistake with a housing benefit claim who then rectified it afterwards. I would have an issue with somebody who fraudulently claimed HB.

At the moment, GB appears to fall into the former category not the latter.

The judge was pretty scathing about the Icebreaker confection.

He said: “Icebreaker is, and was known and understood by all concerned to be, a tax avoidance scheme.

“The aim was to secure [tax] relief for members, and to inflate the scale of the relief by unnecessary borrowing.”

So "all concerned" just hoped HMRC would not spot its real purpose. This is completely different to normal tax planning.

evertonmint, HMRC know what you're doing and are happy with it because our taxes/reliefs/allowances are structured (a) to raise money and (b) to encourage certain behaviours. I think GB is bright enough to know that successive governments were not trying to encourage what he and his fellow investors were up to.

It may not be criminal but, IMO, it's morally iffy at minimum.

Anyone with an ISA is avoiding tax. He took a scheme to encourage a specific industry a bit beyond its limits. Not great but not dreadful either.