Starbucks tax change of heart

It is good to see that Starbucks has responded to public pressure and said that it will pay more tax in the UK in future. Many will say that it is only a calculated decision, paying less than what they might lose due to a boycott or at least a poor public image, but it keeps the issue in the spotlight, increasing the chance of action to reduce the huge amount of tax revenue leaking out of the country's coffers.

I think that all companies above a certain size in the UK should have their headline tax, revenue and profit figures in the public domain, for people to make their own judgements on where to spend their money. Some already avoid Vodaphone after its very public tax let-off and Tesco structures itself and its store ownership to reduce its UK tax liability to much less than most would expect from its massive UK revenue. Even Walkers crisps, with their British potatoes, British flavours and British Gary Lineker advertising their products, is now a Swiss-operated company with Uk only acting as a manufacturing unit, with most of the the profits realised outside the UK. I prefer Seabrook anyway!

Once again the blame lies with incompetence or nest-feathering by successive governments over the past 200 years where we finally arrive at a situation that takes a double-dip recession to force the issue to the surface and for action to begin to be taken. WHEN the tax laws are restructured and WHEN we have international agreements to cover such anomalies perhaps I will change my mind a little on the incompetence or otherwise. But not until. 20 million is peanuts to what they should be paying. As for Amazon and Google and others the answer (at this particular moment in time) lies in all our hands - refuse to deal with them regardless of the consequences of them pulling out or job losses. The pain will be worth the effort in the long run and the tax revenues will (in the long run) benefit the whole much more.

Is this just a smoke screen or diversion?

Surely the tax avoidance of the UK rich should be tightened up first?

Ahh but that would be unpopular with certain people, who have friends.

I may declare myself as a registered Cayman Islands company and ask that my salary is paid offshore in future. This PAYE business really is cramping my style.

I popped into Starbucks this morning. Can't inderstand how they don't make a profit with the prices they charge. Someone must be on the Hey Diddle Diddle.

Strange seeing all the staff with mikes and headsets. They are only selling coffee for Crissakes. How technical is that?

Stop buying headsets and just make coffee. It's not rocket-science. Also had a cinnamon whirl.

tax avoidance of the UK rich is in real terms a drop in the ocean compared to the tax avoidance of the corporates.

Legislation is urgently needed to stop the loopholes, and force companies to pay tax based on the revenue generated in the UK. Schemes such as paying massive rent to offshore companies owning the operating sites, ridiculously high royalties to companies in low-tax companies, huge repayments of artificial loans and many others should all be eliminated, or such deductions capped at sensible levels.

Firstly, and perhaps most effectively, companies' tax payments should be public, perhaps in the form of a league table, so that choices can be made the public can spend their money where it benefits their own country, the modern-day equivalent of buy British. These days is it not so clear which companies and products are 'British' in the old sense of UK-based, manufactured, owned (and taxed).