Celtic and Rangers heroes among football stars facing financial ruin

[aweebluesoandso 290]

Tax avoidance schemes.

 

It makes no difference how many dot to dot games you play, if the investments were made by individuals then they are on the hook for it and the Club can essentially wash its hands of it.

 

Could Celtic have enticed players this way ? Sure, they could have said "We will pay you X per week. However, we know of these tax schemes and if you invest in them then you get multiples of tax relief and therefore your salary is effectively X+ the tax saved from the scheme". Even if they did that HMRC would not be going after Celtic but would be going after the individuals who invested. Those individuals may wish to sue Celtic for bad financial advice but HMRC wouldn't be going after Celtic as they didn't make the investments. With the EBT's we ran the schemes and we also were the ones providing "loans" to players, therefore the Club WAS "up to their neck in it".

 

Even if Celtic did advise this the legal reality is that the individuals chose whether or not to enter that scheme and it became a personal tax affair, not one for Celtic to be concerned about. From a Celtic perspective they paid their players X per week, deducted the tax as per HMRC's tax rates and the individual then did what they wished to do with their personal income.

 

Ours was completely different IIRC. Part of the gross salary was paid as a loan which means that HMRC were not being paid at source, effectively the tax was being withheld by the Club due to the loans.

 

That is my recollection anyway

 

Let the SFA and SPFL set up an inquiry then, to determine whether there were any side letters from the club or directors to their staff and players advising them to join these schemes,. Then hire low level papers gathers, let them have unfettered access to that clubs records and publish their findings, sporting integrity demands it must be seen to be without fear or favour. Catch words that were used to hammer our club

Edited April 15, 2016 by aweebluesoandso

[Uilleam 5,948]

At the last budget new rules which will apply retrospectively were brought in. This legislation targets the people who gained from the schemes personally rather than the companies who ran the scheme.

 

So, even if the SC finds the scheme as operated by Murray, to be legal (on however fine a point), and the loans, therefore, to be loans, and not taxable as earnings, HMRC may pursue the beneficiaries? And may, in the interim, demand a deposit of such tax as it deems "owed", by each of the beneficiaries, until the legal case is fought again? Wow, the Austro Hungarian Empire rides again!

[der Berliner 3,747]

An outspoken bilkobear over on FF also highlights some important point:

 

Re: Keith Jackson - Tax Story

 

The real story here for us looking in, has nothing to do with the legal aspects of these matters.

It has nothing to do with sympathy for the offenders.

(In another more sane and level playing field, I might easily have found some sympathy for them.)

It has nothing really to do with how HMRC are going about their business, I think our experience tells us that HMRC aren't an organisation oozing integrity.

 

The story here is one of monumental hypocrisy from the Scottish press and from our friends in the east, including all the usual suspects from Spiers, to Thomson to the poisoned pens of their toxic pals Haggarty and Three Names, to the dishonesty of Lennon, Hartson and Sutton and of course the Scottish football equivalent of Hitler, ......... Herr Liewell himself.

 

Other hypocrites abound, they will be conspicuous in this matter by the volume of their emphatic silence, big mouths such as Galloway who never missed an opportunity on radio to grotesquely insert denouncements of Rangers Football Club's sin's, to an otherwise bemused nation.

Greenslime the IRA's man in 'Fleet Street', never slow to misinform his readers about Rangers, will true to form find nothing much to say in this matter, other than to present a biased dishonest view slanted as if he had himself been coached by our own corrupt press here in Glasgow.

Hell...I could go on.

 

Suffice to say that the volleys of hatred that has been directed towards Rangers would have been disgusting enough to take, had it been delivered from clean quarters, but that it was hurled from the stinking pus filled and foul mouths of a degenerate phalanx of moral frauds is beyond the extremes of any forgiveness.

Bitterness said Walter................too fckn right we are bitter!

 

http://forum.followfollow.com/showthread.php?1080794-Keith-Jackson-Tax-Story/page9

 

The great shame here is that those carrying the standard of integrity - sporting or otherwise - are neck deep into this and still walk about chin up and a feisty smile upon their lips. While their media cohorts kindly ignore any much of it ... or indeed mix stories hardly related to one another.

 

Still, the answer what would happen if our EBT users start repaying their loans remains ... unanswered.

[craig 5,199]

Let the SFA and SPFL set up an inquiry then, to determine whether there were any side letters from the club or directors to their staff and players advising them to join these schemes,. Then hire low level papers gathers, let them have unfettered access to that clubs records and publish their findings, sporting integrity demands it must be seen to be without fear or favour. Catch words that were used to hammer our club

 

On what grounds would SFA or SPFL be able to take Celtic to task ? They (the Club) met their tax obligations. What their players do with their after-tax salary is their own business. Even if Celtic advised them what to do they were doing it with their own money after the appropriate tax had already been deducted.

 

It is a completely different situation to us as we deducted the loan amounts from gross salary and paid over tax on the net of that (I believe) - Rangers were intrinsically involved in the process. Celtic can say their players personal tax matters are nothing to do with the Club - and they would of course be right.

[boabie 230]

So, even if the SC finds the scheme as operated by Murray, to be legal (on however fine a point), and the loans, therefore, to be loans, and not taxable as earnings, HMRC may pursue the beneficiaries?

 

 

I'd say they'll almost certainly try to do that mate. Where it differs from the film studio racket though is, one was ostensibly a "loan" and the other was a scheme to claim tax relief.

[calscot 0]

Once again, I really don't find the way HMRC are going about this as very ethical. They are changing the rules once again and backdating it and creating a situation where people are possibly using tax breaks in good faith and then being financially ruined with the fickle tax man changes his mind.

 

Surely we need more clarity than that at the time, and in an ongoing way? Surely looking to lower your tax exposure by taking advantage of legitimate schemes which take advantage of tax laws that HMRC create, is something that you should be able to do with confidence?

 

The way I see it is that the tax man should make the rules and then everyone play by them. The rules should be intelligent, transparent and be there for good reason, giving good reason to use them.

 

Weren't tax breaks for the film industry there to encourage filming in the UK and boost our ailing movie industry? I believe Canada do the same meaning a lot of down-town New York scenes in films are actually in Toronto.

 

HMRC seem to be making tax a very dangerous minefield and a nightmare to negotiate. It means many people may only feel safe in paying more tax than they are due and many tax breaks there to help parts of the economy underused and under-invested. Now people paying more tax might sound like a good thing these days, but shouldn't it just be fair and clear, and people pay the fair and clear amount?

 

As Craig says, it gets even worse in that the penalties are so large and the demands so huge that people who may have been perfectly legit cannot afford to appeal and have justice done.

 

It all sounds as crazy as the film Catch 22. There MUST be a better way and the energy put into clawing back the £4.4B in tax EVASION as well as making watertight, but fair and clear rules that people can follow without a mind reader and a clairvoyant?

 

I have absolutely no respect whatsoever for HMRC and I'm sure less and less people do, which is not a good thing for a government trying to nullify the deficit.

[boabie 230]

Once again, I really don't find the way HMRC are going about this as very ethical. They are changing the rules once again and backdating it and creating a situation where people are possibly using tax breaks in good faith and then being financially ruined with the fickle tax man changes his mind.

 

Surely we need more clarity than that at the time, and in an ongoing way? Surely looking to lower your tax exposure by taking advantage of legitimate schemes which take advantage of tax laws that HMRC create, is something that you should be able to do with confidence?

 

The way I see it is that the tax man should make the rules and then everyone play by them. The rules should be intelligent, transparent and be there for good reason, giving good reason to use them.

 

Weren't tax breaks for the film industry there to encourage filming in the UK and boost our ailing movie industry? I believe Canada do the same meaning a lot of down-town New York scenes in films are actually in Toronto.

 

HMRC seem to be making tax a very dangerous minefield and a nightmare to negotiate. It means many people may only feel safe in paying more tax than they are due and many tax breaks there to help parts of the economy underused and under-invested. Now people paying more tax might sound like a good thing these days, but shouldn't it just be fair and clear, and people pay the fair and clear amount?

 

As Craig says, it gets even worse in that the penalties are so large and the demands so huge that people who may have been perfectly legit cannot afford to appeal and have justice done.

 

It all sounds as crazy as the film Catch 22. There MUST be a better way and the energy put into clawing back the £4.4B in tax EVASION as well as making watertight, but fair and clear rules that people can follow without a mind reader and a clairvoyant?

 

I have absolutely no respect whatsoever for HMRC and I'm sure less and less people do, which is not a good thing for a government trying to nullify the deficit.

 

I don't know how long all this debate has been ongoing C but It was the government who recently changed the law at the budget to net anybody who benefited , not HMRC.

[craig 5,199]

Yeah I agree cal - the application retrospectively of the legislation leaves a very bitter taste in the mouth. What makes it all the more compelling is that HMRC themselves provided some of these investors with written communication that these schemes were legal.

 

I completely understand the need to close any tax avoidance loopholes but how the hell can you morally retroactively apply the legislation that you, as an organization, have already deemed to be legal ??? That was YOUR fault in the first place HMRC for leaving the door open to manipulation. Close the loophole, apply the legislation immediately (give people a period of moratorium to divest of their investments) and if anyone still investing in them in the future and claiming tax relief should be given an APN and they can have no complaints.

 

To do it this way is nothing more than a cash grab from HMRC because the tax coffers need strengthened and, to my mind, it is little short of bribery given the quantum of the APN's, effectively preventing many people from appealing the decision.

[craig 5,199]

I believe you are right that the tax breaks were originally created to boost an ailing UK film industry... but clearly the HMRC legislation as released didn't make this specific enough, nor narrow enough, to contain it within the UK industry and it allowed people to use these schemes to effectively provide funding to the Hollywood giants and still get tax relief.

 

That isn't the fault of the investors, it is the fault of those within HMRC who drafted the legislation.

 

I have little sympathy for Celtic or its players - but this case is about far, far more reaching issues than a few Tims and whether "sporting integrity" was breached.

 

It is the unethical, unfair and callous way in which it is being handled by HMRC.

[der Berliner 3,747]

... while somewhere else, Vodafone and and Starbucks smuggle(d) away their billions.