The Guardian: Uncut and Full of Cant
On Saturday morning The Guardian decided to give UK Uncut a front page boost. The protestors managed to shut down three dozen of the 1,720 branches of Barclays bank. Surprised they found any branches to occupy given Saturday opening hours.
The gist of the shabby story was Barclays bankers are evil tax dodgers. The evidence was a hatchet job with the paper making the spurious claim that Barclay’s only paid 1% tax on their £11.6 billion profits. In arriving at a profit before tax figure of £11.6 billion, The Guardian has added the profit from the ongoing business (£4.5 billion) to profits from a disposed business (£726 million) and the gain made on disposal of that business (£6.3 billion) to reach a total of £11.6 billion.
What they chose to ignore however was the total tax take Barclay’s had to pay; payroll taxes, bank levy, non-recoverable VAT, employers NI, SDRT and so on. Over the weekend Tim Worstall and the FCA Blog tore chunks out of the piece:
The article compares the cash paid to HMRC in respect of UK corporation tax in 2009 (£113 million) to the profits generated by the consolidated Barclays group worldwide in 2009. In the UK, tax is paid in arrears, so 2009 taxes would relate to widespread 2008 losses, not 2009 profits.
Multinational companies such as Barclays pay tax in a number of jurisdictions. Generally speaking Barclays only pays UK corporation tax on profits it generated in the UK. Anything earned outside the UK doesn’t get taxed here. So it’s a howler to compare the UK corporation tax payment to the global consolidated profit. Most of those profits were taxed where they were made.
In 2002 (under Gordon Brown, Chuka), the UK government introduced the substantial shareholdings exemption, a corporation tax exemption for UK businesses disposing of a substantial shareholding in a part of their business. The idea was that businesses should be able to restructure their businesses without having to worry about chargeable gains implications. Barclays are heavily criticised by The Guardian for using it. The last time that Guido saw this being used was by the, err, Guardian Media Group to save themselves some £60 million of taxes in 2008:
“In 2008 GMG sold half of Auto Trader publisher Trader Media Group and made an exceptional (one-off) profit of more than £300 million. No tax was payable on the return from that sale because under UK law GMG qualified for SSE”
In 2008 The Guardian made £302 million in profits and paid no corporation taxes. The CEO, Carolyn McCall, was paid an £827,000 package. Yet we don’t see the UK Uncut crowd kicking up a stink about The Guardian’s tax structures or their fat cat pay and bonuses.
Over the weekend the Guardian editor Alan Rusbridger (half-a-million a year since you asked) tweeted about Barclay’s offshore holding corporations. Guardian Media Group holds hundreds of millions in assets in a Caymans Island domiciled offshore corporation.
Guido put it to the GMG press office that GMG has £223.8 million invested in an overseas/offshore hedge fund managed by Cambridge Associates which trades currency derivatives. They don’t deny it and have declined to confirm the fund’s structure for tax purposes.
Guardian readers seem to be under the illusion that it is owned by a not-for-profit charity. The Scott Trust was wound up in October 2008 and the Guardian is a for-profit-privately-owned media business, the well paid directors of which confirm in their annual accounts that they operate tax strategies in line with their fiduciary duty to the shareholders – just like any other business.
The old Scott Trust was set up in 1936 to avoid inheritance taxes and wound up in 2008 so that GMG could cynically exploit the SSE capital gains tax shelter to pay 0% in corporation taxes on their £302 million in profits that year. GMG claim that it was about modernising the holding structure, in fact it was a disingenuous cover for corporate venality.
For three quarters of a century the The Guardian has been shirking taxes, Guido has no problem with them acting in their shareholders’ best interests. The hypocritical cant from them however about others doing the same is beyond contemptible…
Typical left, typical hypocrites
Do they really not see the contradiction ??
lefty tax avoidance = good
other non-lefty big business tax avoidance = bad
Full of cants.
Many BBC ‘star’ names are employed through tax efficient companies rather than directly to the BBC.
Err, to save tax. Cun’ts.
Was the media industry recently bailed-out by the taxpayer to the tune of zillions of quid? No.
Murdoch doesn’t pay UK tax on any of his profits either.
Does Murdoch call for companies to pay more tax than legally necessary?
So what?
As is now widely known Labour never let the truth get in the way of a good story!
…beyond contemptible – makes you sound like Mrs Whitehouse.
We know that the whole spectrum of progressives, as the Guardian claim to be, from hard line Stalinite Commies to wet Liberals are just full of cant, spin and lies. No point wringing your hands its just a fact of life.
But please don’t stop highlighting their cant and hypocrisy.
Oh hold on, wait a minute… what do we have here. In this clip we have the reason why the UK banks pay so little tax. It was because Gordon Brown changed the rules. I be the Guardian didn’t mention that anywhere in their article….
UK uncut = clueless Labour party protest wing.
“Those entrusted by us to regulate those bankers and run our economy washed their hands.”
That’s Gordon mate.
Where did all the money go?
The 8 trillion dollar property bubble that went bang in the US and elsewhere.
Why did parts of the world have a huge property bubble?
The Fed held down interest rates for a long time after 9/11
The US government invented the sub-prme mortgage for poor people and Obama has admitted ‘it was a good idea at the time and we thought we could spread the risk..’
Gordon took house price inflation out of the BoE’s calculations.
The Euro Zone found that one interest rate doesn’t, after all, fit all.
The banks? Sure some sharp and wreckless behaviour, but the banks didn’t set the interest rates and didn’t stoke a property bubble, but did try to spread the sub-prime risks…
Socialist trolls ALWAYS run out of other people’s monikers.
Comment of day
Thank you Steve.
As long as you’re not Billy in disguise, in which case it would be withdrawn
I’m not Billy. However, would using the world “cripple” automatically bring forth accusations of TwaT in disguise?
Only joking. I can’t stand the argumentative tosser and his bazillion aliases.
Guido – you attack the Guardian because they are too left-wing. I attack them because in fact they are too right-wing and/or because they lie – see http://alexweir1949.wordpress.com/2011/02/21/the-guardian-newspaper-lies-again/
Alex Weir, London and Harare
Attack is on their hypocrisy.
They deserve to rot for wrecking the Observer-it has become an unreadable and readerless agit-prop rag under their ownership.
Yet so many self-styled social up-righters swear by the rag and their hypocritical lisping on all things financial.
Would it be wrong to assume the all-righteous Gawdian was, before his rightful demise, a client of the demonic socialist bankster RBS Goodwin (first mate to McLoon)? I think we should be told.
You’re pissing in the wind, Guido. The Average Guardianista never allows the facts to get in the way of reviling a hate-figure. The Truth Being What We Say It Is is a Left-Wing core Value.
Hypocritical Guardian lefties? I have a hard time believing that. Next you’ll be telling us that Polly Toynbee pens her anti-global warming tracts while jetting back and forth between London and her Italian villa.
she can afford to be a socialist…..
It is great when you are a socialist being paid a FORTUNE by other socialists merely for writing bollocks every few days.
Stomach turning hypocrisy is a core left wing value, of course and it helps to be able to churn that out at will.
Welcome back Billy, have a good weekend??
Gruniad making mistakes? Cannot imagine that is true….
Whatever you got up to Billy, we can tell that the weekend certainly wasn’t devoted to spelling and punctuation.
They are are all far more equal than the rest of us, thus are entitled to special tax arrangements…
If only we could stop the BBC propping up their friends at the Grauniad by placing all those jobs ads with them…..
Yes all those ads for non-jobs in government and local councils, skools, the BBC and right-on environmentalist charities funded by our taxes. Oh, hold-on…….
….and reading every story like this verbatum during news bulletins.
The tramp steamer UKUncut looks holed below the waterline. Well done Guido
If you want to annoy a capitalist, tell him a lie. If you want to annoy a socialist, tell them the truth.
I hope this truth really hurts.
I’m shocked and appalled, appalled and shocked I say. To think those lefty, smelly-sock-brigade, lentil-sniffing, salad-munching, soap-dodging, weardy-beardy, sandal-with-sock-wearing, tree-hugging do-gooders are hypocrites. The buggers. Who’da thunk it!
The Guardian employs legitimate tax avoidance measures, whilst Barclays employs legitimate tax avoidance measures.
Oh. Hang on. Can you spot the difference between the two?
Clue: The Guardian are hypocritical.
Any Questions got into the usual tizzy about this:
1.Tax avoidance is legal and legitimate e.g. ISA’s.
2. Tax evasion is illegal.
3. The named businesses are avoiding tax.
4. None of the named businesses are accused of evading taxes.
5. Er…….but we want to have a moan anyway so let’s just muddy the waters and lump it all together.
Great piece Guido
And “No comment” from their Press Officer ?
Try calling Polly Twaddle direct then
Or Sir Shyte Whyte (even better, the sanctimonious prick)
ROFL
If Socialism is a cancer, the Guardian is a lifetime’s supply of industrial-strength cigarettes.
Hold the ‘if’.
Craven A perhaps?
Gitanes, surely?
A 20 packet of half-smoked Untipped Capstan Full Strength forever!
More like mainlining the tar straight into the veins!
Craven? Oh yes, that’s certainly true!
The guardian is a bong full of plutonium.
The level of the The Guardian’s journalism is the same as that of the Toilets Maguire and the Daily MIrror
Any mud slinging goes amoung left-wing cavier socialists…
The only difference between the Guardian and Mirror is the quality of the paper if employed to wipe your arse with…hang on…they are both already so full of shit anyway it would be a pointless exercise.
The Guardian is only there to encourage below average people to waste their money on novelty fads.
Cue mass censorship on Comment Macht Frei now for any mention of Guido’s, or anyone else’s complete slaughter of these hypocrites.
The BBC and the Guardian run the same excrement – and kill any stories they don’t like. What happened to the story about the Labour govenment swapping vital bodily essences with Libya? Will Maummar be seeking a camel friendly palace in Scotland soon?
Poor Frankfurt school crap is all I expect from BBC/Guardian – probably because it is written by sons and daughters of Fabians on ‘work experience’ that the working class will never get a sniff at.
The BBC are worse; read those two blogs and Guido’s and then read
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-12511912
Innuendo and gossipy rubbish; the crowning turd being the little side piece by Joe Lynam, who ever he is
“Barclays has a legal responsibility to its owner – its shareholders – to keep costs including tax to a minimum.
At the same time the Barclays boss himself said that paying tax was one of a bank’s key obligations to society.
Many members of that society will not be pleased to learn that only £113m in corporation tax was paid whilst the bonus pool amounted to £3.4bn.”
Don’t let facts get in the way Joe you pratt.
I wonder how much of that £3.4 billion paid in bonuses finds it’s way to the Treasury in tax payments. Probably not 50%, given that many of the recipients will be well advised about their tax affairs, but still quite a chunk, one would think. Also, as the recipients spend their wealth, they’ll support many jobs in the private sector.
Bonuses are not all bad news for the economy…
Quite so. And I believe that the corporation tax rate for large companies is 28% – it could be argued that the tax take is considerably greater by paying large bonuses and salaries
blank
Spelling Billy your PPE is showing.
Is arranging your tax affairs only bad when lefties do it? Your ‘but the Lefties do it!’ line does you no favours.
Put simply – The GMG didn’t get billions of our tax paying pounds as a bailout.
They don’t also refuse to give a service that is critical to the economic survival of the country after receiving money from the T/P.
Now let’s try and be grown ups.
Nor did Barclays accept any bail-out money.
They didn’t need to – they just stopped lending money and watched their competitors, and the economy, grind to a halt.
Be a grown up and admit you got it wrong.
Nothing wrong Anton. If you have a bouyancy aid and there’s someone drowning, shouldn’t you use it to help them?
Aahhh, wait…’but there’s no law to say that you have to use it’ ad infinitum…
Barclays was the very FIRST bank to use the “liquidity window” at the BoE excuse me
And they received billions for months …
They also received over £200 billion from the Fed in emergency funding
So let’s get the facts right please
The Guardian are bloody hypoctires but Barclays made serious mistakes and were bailed out
*tumbleweed rolls by*
Any more for any more?
Niether did Barclays they went to the Gulf markets and got £3 Billion, wouldn’t want to be a tad hyprocritical would one.
By all means be grown up Peevee but at least be competent. There is also a case to be made that the Gurniad despite it’s lowly circulation is subsidised by the BBC, as the BBC seem to deem it it’s in house paper – and the BBC’s money comes from the majority of the British Public.
so where does all this leave me?
One big corporation which doesn’t pay enough tax argues with another big corporation who doesn’t pay enough tax.
THEY feel smug. YOU pay the difference.
If they have misled HMRC then they should payup, if they are paying as required then get stuffed,but if the country is spending £1.10p and only recieving £1.00p in taxes and blames the bankers who are doing good business lending the 10p then we really have a bunch of wankers political or civil service in the wrong jobs sack them and get a few 5year olds with a computer and good teacher and we will be back on top in no time.
….that’s the point? ‘Misleading’ is one thing, ‘avoiding’ is another.
Both Barclays and GMG ‘avoid’. But only the GMG are getting sanctimonious about other people doing exactly what they are?
It’s not hard, is it?
Up a certain crook without a piddle.
“We’ve brought the coalition to its knees,”
No you haven’t Aaron.
How many knees has it got then ?
He’ll say anything to be parachuted into a safe Labour seat in 2015.
Guardian good,bankers a blot on society,it’s hard wired in so no
This is not what Barclays claim. They claim they are paying all the taxes they should pay both legally and morally.
How does paying 1% of your profit = morality when I pay 40 x more?
As for the payroll taxes – all companies pay payroll taxes – and we pay on profits as well.
Wow. did you actually read the article? Scary.
I hardly think you can compare a tin pot operation like the Guardian to Barclays Bank.
Secondly the fact teh Gruaniad or anyone else doesn’t pay its fair whack of taxes is hardly justification for other companies not paying.
We’re not saying that. We’re saying they can hardly point the finger if they’re doing exactly the same.
I think they can. The fact there is an element of hypocrisy in it does not distract from the truth of what they are saying.
An ELEMENT of hypocrisy? Are you fucking kidding? Their story is ENTIRELY hypocritical.
You’ve still ignored comments about the fact you’ve clearly not read the article, as if you had, you’d be aware that the figures are based on Barclays’ UK tax payment expressed as a percentage of their worldwide profit.
They have paid tax on profits abroad to the relevant authorities – this 1% figure not an accurate representation of Barclay’s global tax payments.
Aside from that, the simple fact is that they’ve not broken any laws, and I don’t believe for a moment that you would EVER pay more tax than you’re required to, regardless of how much money you were making.
If you want to take the moral stance on it, that’s a matter for the government to sort out – the last lot weren’t interested in doing so, in fact they made it easier to avoid tax (note: avoid, NOT evade). I doubt if the new lot will be any more interested in changing anything either.
Have you actually worked out how much tax you pay on your gross salary? 40% only applies over £35k, with 50% over £150k (ignoring allowances).
For you to be paying 40% you would need a gross income of about £250k. If you do earn that and pay it all then you are a clown. I suspect your tax bill is much closer to (and probably below) 20% overall.
Guido
The fact that The Guardian are having us over a barrel does not excuse Barclays doing the same.
The banks using us the lender of last resort and avoiding payment of proper tax receipts is not ‘the market’ it is a result of long term political corruption.
So speaks a capitalist of the Austrian school so you really can’t condemn me as a leftie.
Barclays did not pay only 1% tax – see the article for why that number is either a mistake or a lie.
We socialists do as we please! Got it?! Now, let’s protest more banks and sing The Red Flag!
Us people living in the real world do hereby renounce our goodwill and will no longer be feeding and clothing you.
That is all. You may leave.
I am trying to find out more about Labour fiddling inflation figures.Can’t seem to find anything on the BBC. Anything in the Guardian?
Dare I say it, I think that may be the most spot on and powerful post ever, Guido. A lacerating attack on barefaced hypocrisy.
This site wants a final solution for The Guardian.
The mob will come after millionaires like you Waddle Waddle
Before honest taxpayers like me
LABOUR IS A TOXIC CRIMINAL BRAND
ESPECIALLY IN SCOTLAND
Excellent post. As a licence fee payer I expect and demand that the BBC get someone from the Guardian to comment on this lefty hypocrisy.
Or, for balance, when covering this story (as they do) they could mention that the Guardian also benefits from tax avoidance.
**hollow laugh**
Yeah but they’re lefty cants, only fellow lefties believe the drivel they print
The Guardian is full of cants.
But would they give me a job ?
Barclays actually paid £1.5 billion (25%) of their accounting profits in corporate income tax around the world. That’s £1.5 billion more than GMG and the Labour Party combined.
It just turns out that most of the tax wasn’t paid in the UK. Paying tax in country A rather than country B is not tax avoidance. It just reflects where the profits fall. If they are being taxed then the profits aren’t arising in a tax haven.
Our £ 100 million in our hedge fund will see us though for a few more years
You never know, it could produce huge returns from speculation…
Privet or Beech?
Holly, makes it harder for the burglars.
Fuck me, I hope the BBC lefties get a TV crew down to their fellow lefties offices pronto
There’s going to be an almighty demo there, from left wing firebrands, anarchists, and Aaron Porter’s useful idiots.
They might even confront Ms Toynbee if she’s back from her Italian villa today having used zero carbon emissions to travel of course
Any minute now the stories of a major demo will be hitting the wires……
Any moment now people
I wonder if the Grauniad have any fire extinguishers and a suitable roof from which to hurl them; do you happen to know, Mr intensely?
We danna go after our own you feckun Tory bastard
don’t foget their lobbying for VAT exemption
So Guido and his Tory Troll followers are now fans, and defenders of Barcleys BANK…..Good luck with that one
We have been told to tell you “No comment” Guido
The truth hurts too much for us, you see ?
Actually not Billy, a capitla E in ‘Eh’ after a comma is not good. Your failed with the e in grammar, so it’s quits.
*sigh*
I failed with the r in you.
You should spell check before posting
Your = You
Sorry to rain on your parade but, if you want to get this correct, there are no spaces before exclamation marks, question marks, commas, semi-comas, colons or full stops.
Bit of a bugger about the moniker, really.
Also, there is no ‘e’ in grammar.
So Guido and his merry bang of Tory Trolls are noe defending a bank…yawn
Fawkes is also defending the Guardians right to evade taxes within the law, it’s just that they’re hypocritical liars about it.
Your knowledge of British banking is far greater than we windowlickers have so instead of sitting outside throwing pebbles and hissing at us,come on in and explain,even tame lefties do get a fair hearing before we throw them to the wolves.
The BBC and the Guardian are really cynical, vicious, lying bastards. They’re only in it for the soundbite, and fuck the truth.
Has that comment been sanctioned by the Eds?
the whole world’s kinda just gone crazy, it’s turned upside down
Amazing insight into the minds of anti-socialists here.
How DARE someone own property and not get with the program. Attack her!
How dare a ‘left leaning’ but world renowned journalistic institution do the same thing that every other large business does. Attack them!
Oh dear…… I think you should read the article again
I’m referring to the comments.
There’s none so blind as those that don’t want to see.
You mean the comments based on people actually READING the article? as stated below its about the hypocrisy of the Guardian!
No, I mean the comments based on peoples preconceived and, dare I say, prejudiced views about anyone with a different political/economic persuasion to themselves.
Hope this helps.
You haven’t read the post, have you?
Guido has no problem with the Guardian’s tax arrangements (or anybody else’s provided they’re legal) but he does have a problem with the Guardian criticising other organisations for doing what the Guardian does – legally avoid tax.
The story is about the hypocrisy of the Guardian and the fact that there are numerous factual errors, or did you not bother to read the post.
Let’s try again…
The main story doesn’t refer to anyones Italian villa,the BBC being a communist sop, refer to socialism as a ‘cancer’, etc etc.
The comments do.
Hope this helps.
Listen if you want to start with the bullshit its you that called the guardian and i quote “‘left leaning’ but world renowned journalistic institution”
If your going to come out with such claptrap as that then people can say what they want!
Back on topic i think the Majority of comments refer to The Guardian being hypocrits.
Hope this helps you, a favour is a favour in return and all that!
Ahhh, so because I didn’t get with the lefty bashing my views are not valid?
Echo Chamber anyone?
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Echo_chamber_(media)?wasRedirected=true
Don’t take it personally its not because your a lefty its just that your an ill informed fuck wit. So in light of your echo chamber re-direct! stick this in your Echo chamber which is FACT!
In 2008 the Guardian made £302 million in profits and paid no corporation taxes – Hypocritical twats
In 2008 the Guardian made £302 million in profits and paid no corporation taxes – Hypocritical twats
In 2008 the Guardian made £302 million in profits and paid no corporation taxes – Hypocritical twats
In 2008 the Guardian made £302 million in profits and paid no corporation taxes – Hypocritical twats
I don’t think you’re understanding this echo chamber lark.
It’s a figurative concept. It’s not a REAL echo chamber. That would just be silly wouldn’t it?!
Now I’ll bid you adieu as you try and get the hang of this debating malarkey.
Toynbee is a fucking hypocrite, so get real you socialist tosser.
Wow, so eloquent! Your mummy must be so proud of you.
Is it so hard to accept a difference of opinion, one that is based upon facts and not ideology or point scoring?
I wonder if you realise, just how stupid your post, makes you look?
Both rightly, avoid paying too much tax.
Only one however, lectures the population endlessly, regarding the ‘unpatriotic evils’ of such behaviour.
Your ‘world renowned journalistic institution’ (sic) is world renowned for it’s innacurate, biased reporting and weapons grade hypocrisy.
If having a different take on the matters in hand makes someone ‘look stupid’ in your book, then what a insecure and nasty little book it must be.
Once more, I am referring to the comments section, not the truth/quality/thrust of the main article.
Don’t shoot the messenger and all that.
You leftists really don’t understand the term “hypocrisy”, do you? See Polly, Monbiot, etc.
@Guido, re: comment at 1300: “Nor did Barclays accept any bail-out money.”
This is incorrect. Barclays is benefiting from several billion in Guaranteed Liabilities:
http://www.dmo.gov.uk/index.aspx?page=CGS/CGSLiabilities
You’re on the wrong side of history here my friend – whatever the details of individual cases, mass tax avoidance sucks money out the economy and impoverishes the people of this country.
Attacking a hypocritical newspaper shows that you’re more interested in cheap political point scoring than the real problems affecting real people – just like the rest of the political class that have let us down so badly.
That link shows debt issues launched by banks in 2008/9 which utilised the government’s guarantee, for which the banks paid the Treasury a fee. As the Treasury would be forced to bail out failing banks in any case, it seemed a much better idea to allow the banks to access the capital markets with a fee-generating guarantee.
Since then, the UK banks have not needed to use the platform as the securities market is gradually reopening for business and the banks are now regarded as solvent. This is not the case for the Irish banks which continue to issue GGBs.
Misleading. If Barclays had been successful in its bid for ABN Amro, then your remarks would, in all probability, have had validity. As it happens, Barclays did not need these monies to survive. Why should they not have availed themselves of them? Some revisionism going on in your history, it would appear.
“Nor did Barclays accept any bail-out money.”
To say nothing of the rather big hole in their balance sheet if HBOS,RBS and Northern Rock had been allowed to fail.
Northern Rock should have been allowed to fail.
JordanNewell turned out to be a puffed up nobody. He used to be your next MP!!!!
PPE is still showing Billy,years of training makes it hard to be a thicko.
On the subject of fairness, Bankers are being singled out for special taxation on their bonuses on the grounds that the Banks are in receipt of large amounts of public money.
So how about applying the same principle to all those BBC, NHS, and Local Authority staff who are earning (Correction; “Being Paid”), large multiples of the PM’s salary?
EVERYONE (mostly) works very hard for their money, even those on the minimum wage, so “Hard work” is no excuse for a huge salary.
I am no Communist, but there is clearly a problem with the cliques of Executives who have effectively been allowed to determine their own pay through an incestuous relationship with Pay Advisory Bodies.
On the face of it, that would seem fair.
The difference being that with possibly a few exceptions, no one in NHS/BBC etc gets paid more (some might say astronomically more) for taking greater and greater risks with other peoples money.
That’s debatable – some might say that following scandals in North Staffordshire and the recent report into NHS care of the elderly, some people are being paid obscene sums to take risks with other peoples’ lives. In many ways, that’s far worse.
+1
As the banks keep telling us – you pay peanuts, you get monkeys.
Nurses get poor wages, large workloads, and not great conditions – their practice may well suffer.
Not sure how that links to the banking debacle but I’m all ears on any evidence you can provide.
Those being paid massive amounts are a law unto themselves, aided by successive governments.
In this brave new world of the mixed economy of care, quasi markets and all, I’m sure that utopia is just four years away
The NHS budget was £110 billion last year – that’s £1800 (near enough) for each and every man, woman and child in the country – for one year. Add to that the new hospitals being built on PFI deals.
Hardly ‘peanuts’, is it?
Moley, all council pay should be set by a panel from the local Chamber of Commerce and the local FSB. If the applicant doesn’t agree with what is considered a fair local rate for the job, they can gop elsewhere. End of problem.
Bankers aren’t being given large amounts of cash like the BBC and the public sector. They are issuing shares in return. Your arguments are reasonable but should be applied more strongly to the public sector.
PLEASE share this folks:
George Monbigot is carrying out a speaking tour, where he claims he will debate ANYTHING with the audience
http://www.monbiot.com/2011/01/07/spring-and-summer-speaking-tour/
ukuncut, economics, housing, climate change – the list of topics to hammer this twerp on is endless.
Today seems like total cant day on behalf of Liebour. The odious twat Hain is reported in the Daily Post newspaper as telling the Welsh Labour Conference that the deficit was nothing to do with the previous government’s policies. Worth a read just to see how history’s being currently re-written…..
‘Deficit not our fault’ Hain tells Labour conference in Llandudno
“Adamant that “irresponsible bankers caused the crisis”, he said in a direct challenge to the Prime Minister: “Mr Cameron, tell the truth about debt.”
Guido you are preaching to the converted. There is no way that the mainstream press are going to pick this up and run with it. The facts as you have set them out have been available for some time…
ANY TAKERS ????
@SallyBercow
Sally Bercow
@millymarch hahahaha! I’m a sucker for a provocative tweeter though
14 hours ago via Echofon Favorite Retweet Reply </i?
You forgot their little business in Luxembourg:
Private Eye 1242 p7
Street of Shame: Grauning Wallets
Guardian Media Group continues to tie itself in knots over tax.
“The board believes it is the group’s corporate and social responsibility to pay the appropriate amount of taxes in accordance with UK and overseas tax legislation,” says the annual report. “The board also believes that it has a commercial responsibility to manage the group’s affairs in a tax-efficient manner within those rules as well as to manage the group’s exposure to tax. The group adopts a conservative tax strategy and is transparent in its dealings with tax.”
Despite all this earnest wittering, transparency is in short supply. Buried on page 86 is the admission that two of GMG’s holding companies in magazine publisher Emap (which it jointly owns with a private equity firm Apax), Eden Acquisition 2 Ltd and Eden Acquisition 4 Ltd, are registered in the Cayman Islands.
There is also mention of a third company, called Eden 2 & Cie SCA. Where is this registered? The report doesn’t say. But a trawl of international company records gives an address on 41 Boulevard Prince Henri in that well-known haven of tax transparency and non-avoidance, the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg!
A little bit more on the Luxembourg company from an EMAP annual report:
Eden 2 & CIE SCA, incorporated in Luxembourg, is regarded by the directors as the Company’s ultimate parent undertaking. This is a joint venture between the Apax Europe VII Fund, which is managed by Apax Partners Europe Managers Ltd, incorporated in England and Wales, and Guardian Media Group plc, incorporated in England and Wales. All the ordinary shares of Guardian Media Group plc are owned by the Scott Trust. The directors regard Eden 2 & CIE SCA as the ultimate controlling party.
Eden Bidco is established in the Cayman Islands, and Eden 2 & CIE SCA is established in Luxembourg. No Group accounts have been prepared for these companies or for any other intermediate holding company.
http://www.emap.com/__data/assets/pdf_file/0020/7544/Accounts-Dec-2009-Emap-International-Ltd.pdf
Notice also another little vehicle whose name crops up for the first time, Eden Acquisition 5 Limited, registered in the Cayman Islands along with all the other little Edens.
Barclays has benefitted from the taxpayer bailout of the banking system. If there had been a run on the banks (remember all those people queueing outside Northern Rock) Barclays too would have suffered. Gordon Brown and others managed to avoid that with their bail out.
Barclays has also benefitted and is benefitting from the Q.E. done by the government which means Barclays bank can borrow money at very low rates and lend it out at much higher rates thus making a massive profit.
I have recently closed my account at Barclays because I don’t agree with their behaviour and especially don’t like the enormous sums they pay to their executives. I have decided to bank with the Co-op instead.
Thank fuck for that
Thank you for bearing me out about the present-day management of this once decent bank.
Wouldn’t happen at Swallow Bank
“I shall take my overdraught elsewhere.”
“Thank you, madam. The door’s that way.”
Mrs Merritt has none.
“Gordon Brown and others managed to avoid that with their bail out.”
Arrant nonsense. It would only be true if he did that with his own personal money. He did it with our money. If I managed to pledge whatever you now have in the Co-op to support my disastrous spending programme, you would not be too pleased either, I would imagine.
I’m pleased that you agree taxpayers money was used by Gordon Brown to bail out the banks, including Barclays.
Of course there would be no point disagreeing, since the facts are plain.
I agree nothing of the sort. As argued elsewhere here, Barclays did not require a bail out.
You talk about Q.E. as if it were a badge. Well, it isn’t. It is a clear indication of failure on behalf of a government which had 13 years to get things right, but managed to get them totally wrong.
Just give me your bank account details and a signing mandate on it, if you are so sure of your position and then we can talk again.
You must think I’m as daft as you are. I will certainly not give out my bank account details in a public forum.
I do think you’re daft. Of course I don’t want your money, I have my own. I was inviting you to accept the consequences of your wonky reasoning.
But if it turns out that you are sensible, then I am glad that I am daft.
Barclays weren’t even close to running out of funding the way that Northern Rock were and if RBS and Lloyds had gone under they probably would have been OK because 60% of their business is outside the UK. They only took liquidity funding because the price was right. When the government came offering loans at 12% with strings attached they went and got themselves a better deal from Qatar.
Ah yes the coop? the labour party bank of choice who also seem to be very good at paying sod all tax = 1.9% on £164million !!
So you are expecting an individual to pay Corporation tax?
good stuff guido.
Just finished reading a Colossal Failure of Common Sense about Lehmans.
He was right you’know it started in america, but the one eyed mong STILL made it bad for us.
oh, and the GMG can go hang, between you and PE you should be able to finnish them off.
Tis a shame the dwarf Hislop hates this site
Hypocrisy and mendacity. It’s in Liebour’s D-N-A.
Brown and Balls the deficit denyers – Guido the profit denyer!!
Banks borrow money at 0.5 percent and loan it to me at 5.0 percent. This is a factor ten times.
With that sort of markup, it would be hard not to make a thumping great profit.
Now if I could get around 0.5 percent interest on borrowing, my small business would too would make a thumping profit.
Yes. Banks, unlike almost all other businesses, are being subsidised by the taxpayer. And yet there are still those who worship the banks as beacons of the free market.
Absloutely right Guido.
In the old days the Guardian used to report factually and in a balanced way.
Nowadays the news is mostly opinions not a balanced presentation of the facts.
Shame on you Guardian.
Used to work on a tropical island north of Australia. Airmail edition of Manchester Guardian was published on a Wednesday. I got it Thursday evening. You are right: it was excellent. But I always wondered how they got it out there so fast.
So Guido thinks it right that the UK Tax payer should bail out the UK Banking Industry (and yes Barclays would have suffered if HBOS and RBS had gone to the wall) by covering its losses and then it allows the same industry to claim tax relief for the same losses which the tax payer has covered. RBS alone has an unrecognised deferred tax asset of £3.6bn in respect of unrecovered tax losses.
In the meantime that paragon of Guido capitalism, Barclays has doubled its wages bill since 2007, kept its profit at about the same level and halved its share price. Any sensible capitalist/shareholder given such a performance would be calling for Diamond’s head rather than attacking the Guardian. But I presume the order has gone out not to bash the bankers (or should I say party donors).
No Guido was totally opposed to the bail-out of the banks here and in Ireland, don’t believe in socialism for bankers or anyone else.
Am attacking Guardian hypocrisy.
“Guido was totally opposed to the bail-out of the banks here and in Ireland”
And the US and Europe as well presumably – so we would all be reliant on the Bank of China for our banking and Guido would be taking his seat on the Chinese poliburo whose appraoch to capitalism he so warmly endorsed when visiting Hong Kong at the time of the Tibetan riots!
You do realise that Hong Kong isn’t governed by the Chinese Communists, don’t you? Hong Kong governs itself, and has one of the most successful, vibrant, fast-growing economies in the world.
Free market.
I’ll spell it out for you
T h e p o s t i s a b o u t t h e h y p o c ri s y o f t h e G u a r d i a n, n o t a b o u t t h e B a n k s.
As well as learning to use your keyboard properly, you need to understand that Guido has a pupose in attacking the Guardian whose tax avoidance is minimal compared with that of the Guardian (just exactly how much profit has the Guardian Group earned over the past 20 years compared with Barclays? work that out then you might understand something). My role in life is not to defend the Guardian which is perfectly capable of defending itself.
“the Guardian whose tax avoidance is minimal compared with that of the Guardian”
What’s all that about?
Oops = I meant Barclays
lol the guy is off his rocker, so it’s ok for everyone else but the banks to do it just because they are minimal offenders?
Doh? ever heard of death by a thousands cuts, every penny counts etc. etc.?
It all adds up in the end sunshine.
So where were the previous posts from Guido attacking Barclays tax avoidance? Don’t you understand that Guido sees nothing wrong with Barclay’s avoiding tax? Guido has repeatedly made the point that he is in favour of all tax avoidance. My position is that you should go after the big fish first whoever they may be.
Brilliant piece Guido. It would make a good subject for an investigative TV programme. Do you think the BBC might be intertested ? – Thought not.
Labour’s attacks here are clearly co-ordinated. Even so, with all the advantage of surprise on their side, they cannot present a sound case on anything, especially if it has to do with money.
Who the fuck wastes money on buying the guardian or any other rag out of their own pocket these days?
I just want to know so I can point and laugh.
left wing media types who think they know better than everyone else buy the guardian, or in the case of one bloke I know who is an ex combat 18 member, to look like he fits in with all the others at the quango he works at…
Would you like some salt with that chip sir?
When are we going to stop propping up this private business with taxpayer’s money through giving the Guardian the public sector ads? Why the *$%& do we want public sector jobs going largely to Guardian readers in the first place?
The USA under Obama’s misrule is worse than it was under Bush (and I never thought I would end-up thinking that!)
I do not want to visit a country that requires me to prove I am not a terrorist by submitting to sexual assault.
BTW, all this “security” at the USA airports is for show. Have any of you ever attempted to fly to America without a Visa and a passport?
How close to getting on a plane would you get?
The “underpants bomber” had no passport and was on a terrorist watch list and yet he was still “waived past security” in Paris by a “well dressed man” according to other passengers on that plane and this was admitted to by the FBI and various mainstream media outlets.
So, How the fuck do you keep people safe if the “terrorists” (nudge nudge wink wink) are allowed past all the security that you and I have to suffer?
This is information which has been reported on NBC, CBS, FOX, CNN and yet they do not actually go that extra bit of logical though and ask HOW THE FUCK DID A KNOWN TERRORIST GET ALLOWED ON A PLANE IN THE FIRST PLACE?
Fuck all that sexual molestation at American airports, when terrorists are escorted around security to be allowed on planes, all the perverted molestation in the world will not stop the terrorists from blowing up planes, IF they really want to and are not actually the security services themselves doing it.
I mean, WHO has the authority to get a known “terrorist” without a passport, past security and then onto a plane in the first place?
No doubt that it will be Gordon Browns fault !
Andrew Edinburghj
Is “UK Uncut” an anagram of Chucker’s full name?
So, what happened to that Lib Dem scandal?
http://www.virtuallynaked.co.uk/2011/02/21/so-guido-what-happened-to-that-lib-dem-scandal/
This UKUncut thingy – is it a bunch of blokes who are still in possession of their foreskins? Perhaps the accumulated smegma is starting to addle their brains.
Good work, always nice to see hypocrisy shredded in this way.
oh did the nasty man at the guardian tell fibs about those poor bankers
how will the poor bankers cope – bless them
such a vulnerable bunch the bankers – scraping a living on a few billion here and there. one of the more oppressed parts of our society. the bankers need guido to stand up for them because we know they cant look after themselves
A National Newspaper telling outright bollocks, espeecially when they live in fucking big glass house, is what makes the British news media so world-class!
UKUncut is just a Liebour black-ops organisation who will get publicity for their bullshit because the left-wing media, like the Guardian and BBC, will give it to them. If Labour were still in, they wouldn’t exist.
brilliant article, if a thousand words paint a picture, I see Polly having a piece of heavily used andrex smeared across her wrinkled face.
Well said sir!
In short – the GmG should get their facts/tax straight before casting stones at the other glass houses. It is always amazing to me that media outlets privately owned in this country can reflect the news in such a cock-eyed manner.
It sickens me that Polly Toynbee preaches about the poor when she’s got millions of her own whilst conveniently forgetting this when bashing ‘millionaires’ row of the cabinet.
It’s a shame more don’t read your blog in the wider world GF because you have a very good way of evening out the road for all sides!
It was not just the Guardian – all of this was repeated by the BBC.
Of course the BBC and Guardian are basically the same thing – and their continued existance is the fault of the failure of Conservatives to get rid of the BBC tax (the “license fee” funds the BBC, and BBC ads in the Guardian fund the newspaper).
However, the news on commercial broadcasters (such as Classic FM) was much the same.
All radio and television in Britain is basically the Guardian – the regulations make it so.
Reading this site is more stomach churning than reading the comments on the Telegraph site.
I thought humanity was doomed, Reading this site I know it and furthermore we deserve to be.
More sour grapes at the MASSIVE Guardian profits. Makes the banks look like tramps.
For a right-wing paper, it is doing some worthy work – the work with wikileaks, for a start. Find a left-wing media corporation squirrelling away its billions, and you’ll have a target for hypocrisy, son.
Until then, the only hypocrisy is yours, and your apologies for the banks and their collective gangsterism.