I hope you don't have an ISA, otherwise you are avoiding tax on your savings interest. If you don't smoke you'd better start else you'll be avoiding tobacco tax. Where do you draw the line when 'all tax avoidance should be illegal' ?
As ever in life it's not black or white - there's a line through many shades of grey. In my world, ISAs are pretty pale and people buying rubber plantations in Belize are much darker. Vin
England v India: Having been set a low target of 201 by India, England lost 5 quick wickets. Now staging a come back with Butler on 53, Taylor on 69. Need 36 runs from 59 balls. England should win, but never underestimate an England cricket team's ability to blow it.
England win and go into the Sunday final v Australia. We were 5 wickets down with 11 to get from 34 balls....how did we manage to give India hope from there? But 2 quick wickets lost and we managed it. Never relaxing supporting England.
Have you asked yourself yet why the price of oil is so low..? OK, not absolutely low, we're still buying petrol for over a £1 per litre, mainly due to taxation, but relatively low in the face of political and economic pointers which suggest it should be much higher. The climate for oil is so depressed that one or two major oil companies are getting out of fossil fuels altogether. If this was a temporary blip they certainly wouldn't be doing that. France's biggest, Total is moving out, and Britain's own BP, which had a go and then backtracked, is now getting itself sorted to do the same, or at least diversify away majorly. Royal Dutch Shell is cutting back hugely on its research into new oil fields, an several others are doing the same. Yes, the Saudi's can, and do, pump fuel for whatever price they choose. It's so cheap for them it's nearly all profit. So they charge just about as much as the market will bear. At the moment, fracking companies in the USA are providing fuel and gas for low prices because they are being backed by the government. Why are they doing this..? Is it to disturb the Russians, who are in Ukraine,l to tell them to get out, or their main export of oil and gas will be a loser for them..? Or is it that the global economy is finally starting to realign itself, in the wake of climate change..? I don't really know. There are other forms of power than oil and gas, but none as relatively safe, relatively abundant, or relatively cheap. Solar, Wind and Wave power are still fringe producers that are hampered by inefficiency and the weather. They are not troubling oil and gas for the foreseeable future. Nuclear fission's days may appear to be done, although not in the UK. We've signed up with EDF to build several at enormous cost. The electricity they provide will be the highest priced ever. If LENR [Low Energy Nuclear Reactions] has its way, all these things, oil, gas, nuclear, solar, wind and wave, will be obsolete within 5-10 years. Thing is, it appears that it's no longer an if, but a when. It appears that Fleischmann and Pons of Southampton University really did have something going after all. Their announcement ruined their serious scientific careers, and Fleischmann died in 2012, so he never got to see what has happened in the last couple of years. LENR is being ratified as a fact. In fact, the dust has already settled on the indecision. The scientists are merely getting their postures sorted. Scientists left Cold Fusion alone in 1989 because physics said it was impossible. Thank goodness for engineers then, who don't think in such absolute terms. I'm not putting a single link. Just click here LENR That's a little bit different for Koeman's Korner.
You presume to know a lot about my personal financial situation. If I disagree with sentencing for murder, is that because I'm a murderer? I have a problem, previously discussed, with speed cameras and their locations, but I don't habitually drive over the speed limit. In fact, I am currently 95% PAYE and work in education. I wish I had the opportunity to even think about the need to avoid tax. I used to be self-employed and did my best to lessen my tax burden, WITHIN THE RULES. Of course, being self-employed, I had no pension other than that which I set up privately (tax deductable) and no paid holidays. I had no days off sick for 25 years (no sick pay). I now get loads of free time, a great pension and the college will close if a snowflake blows in from the Brecon Beacons. It's great being a taxpayer in those circumstances. I find government retrospectively applying new interpretations of tax laws, based on moral rather than legal grounds, to be disingenuous. I reiterate; I have NO PROBLEM with the government closing loopholes, changing laws and penalising people who EVADE tax. I disapprove of people who use legal scams to avoid paying their fair share, but that's my opinion, not a basis of law. The answer is to change the law. BTW Re: Diana. I suppose you have a point. After all, following the mass weep-in, she was voted the THIRD greatest Briton in history. Hysteria?....surely not!
OK. Fair enough.Then maybe you should have used "one" rather than "you." You still inferred, from your question, that you thought I might.
I should have, but it was early in the morning. Sorry if it seemed I was having a go at you. I just dislike people (specially mega rich people) that go out of their way to pay less tax.
No hard feelings! I also dislike over-greedy types, but they should be constrained within the law, which should be changed if it is insufficient. The problem with the term "tax avoidance" is that is lumps perfectly respectable, law abiding, tax paying citizens , who want to avoid a heavy burden, with multi millionaires who resent paying anything. The introduction of "aggressive tax avoidance" is merely a knee jerk sticking plaster based on moral grounds. When it comes to morals, I don't need lectures from the likes of Cameron, Milliband, Mandelson, Balls! What do they know of morals?
