No. Local profits are taxed locally. That’s the nonsense of the taxation of windfall taxes on oil companies: most of their profits are made and taxed where they extract and process the oil. The only profits they make in the UK are from selling us imported fuel at the pump. A UK based multinational gets tax relief for profits that have already been taxed abroad. The same is true in reverse for foreign companies operating here. UK profits are taxed in the UK and relief is given in their home countries. That’s a good system. I’m not going to deny that where profits arise can’t be manipulated to a certain extent but that’s the principle. HMRC keep a very close eye on transfer prices, which determine what tax is paid where. As the quote points out, it’s not just corporate taxes: employing people in the UK generates UK payroll taxes in the UK and indeed VAT and so on when the wages are spent. But the big benefit is of course the jobs themselves. If you meant repatriation of residual cash, there’s nothing to stop a overseas subsidiary paying large dividends and they may be funded by inter-company loans, all subject of course to being able to pay its creditors.
I watched the Galatasaray v Man Utd in the Champions League game last evening (or at least some of it while doing other things). Man Utd paid £47m for their new goal keeper Andre Onana. African football has come on leaps and bounds since teams first appeared in the World Cup and some of the world's best players are now from that continent. But this guy looks as though he's come through from the 1970's with the new Doctor Who. His best save of the evening was an acrobatic leap to catch a shot that was at least 2 yards wide of the post. It was a totally unnecessary risk of giving away a corner. Most goalkeepers would have ignored it with distain. The "neat pirouette" referred to in this article was in fact a lunatic charge all the way up to the centre spot to collect a clearance from the Galatasaray box which nearly led to him being dispossessed with the goal unguarded. Very poor judgement making Jordan Pickford look calm, chilled and measured. Having seen him a couple of times now, if he's worth £47m, quite frankly Michael Cooper is worth £470m as a absolute minimum. https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/67573636
OK how do we allow a Abu Dhabi backed takeover of the Daily Telegraph to take place ? Who will be in charge of editorial out put ? How will national security be effected by one of our broadsheet papers being owned by a foreign organisation ? Lloyds Banking Group only took control of the Telegraph and the Spectator in June from the Barclay family....they are now pursuing a £1.2bn deal to hand over control of the titles to RedBirdIMI....a fund backed by Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed Al-Nahyan,...the vice-president of the United Aran Emirates. Is this not "disturbing" and should it not be prevented ?.
Most of the population do not read any daily papers these days so my view would be who bloody cares. Anyone influenced by a news paper should be locked away for their own protection anyway.
But they are an important voice in our democracy. Or some of them anyway - The Times, Grauniad, Financial Times, the I. That’s it The rest are no longer deemed fit to wrap fish and chips and they aren’t fit to read either. I do still value the local press even though it’s basically all one company. It’s an important function they are trying to fulfill although some of the headlines are hilarious. “Chaos As Man Drops Car Keys”. “Fury As Popular Pub Has No Peanuts”. “Woman Rues Not Bringing Umbrella As Town Suffers Short Spell Of Drizzle “. “Police Criticised For Charging Man With “Having An Offensive Wife””. “Couple Claim Their Dog Painted The Mona Lisa”. “Traffic Chaos As People Drive Their Cars“. “Have You Seen This Man? Well, Don’t, He’s Dangerous “
The News Shopper used to be a valued local free paper....20/30/40 years ago......my son for awhile used to get 2000 dropped off every week to deliver.....it was a very local paper in those days and was titled "The Orpington News Shopper" and was very good for local news.....and worked out of a quite a big office block. Then it started to change....the title changed to the "Bromley and Orpington News Shopper" and the news wasn't so local.....and it stopped being delivered.....key supermarkets and high street stands appeared.....and if you didn't frequent one of those spots on a Thursday....you ended up missing out. I picked one up recently and noticed that the title had changed to the "Bromley News Shopper" (a borough of a third of a million people).....the local news was literally non-existent. Even though Bromley FC where doing well they weren't mentioned.....maybe an article about Charlton or C Palace or even W Ham.....and the news was no better than a national paper...literally nothing anymore of local interest....in fact local news is very hard to find anywhere these days.
I saw an interview with a media person some time ago. They were asked about the poor quality of local newspapers, which contained little more than advertising. You can't argue with the answer. Years ago, people expected to pay for local newspapers. Indeed my own dad used to walk up to the Fore Street on Saturday night to get what was then the Evening Herald to get the report on Argyle's game. We have the internet for that now, for free. We used to get the Cornish Guardian on a Thursday too. It still exists but with a circulation of below 3,000 a week. Just think on that. they'd written an Argyle match report, printed it, got it on the train and on to the streets in mid Cornwall by 7:30 or 8pm. Not nowadays. I do get the Western Morning News twice a week. She reads the horoscopes and I read the news and Argyle items that I read the day before on the internet. I do like horoscopes at Christmas. "You will get visits from friends and relatives you haven't seen for a while" or "You can expect surprise gifts". No **** Sherlock.
I had the "The Times" delivered by mistake one Saturday.....not very readable....the Sports pages where so inferior to the "Telegraph's coverage.....and the TV supplement for the coming week was poorly laid out and in rather small print.....I did complain to the newsagent and they apologised and didn't charge me for the error.....but even being free made the experience no better. The one paper that I find really unpleasant is the "Mail"......I wouldn't even bother to cut it up into squares and hang it up in the outdoors lavvy....(not that we have one). When I was between 8/12 yrs of age we used to spend a fortnight each summer looking after my fathers sisters small farm whilst she had a break....it was tucked in the back of nowhere outside of the welsh village of Meifod.....7 miles from Welshpool. (one bus a week (1950's). There was a vegetable garden next to the Farm house....which was huge....about 60 yards long....and down the bottom right hand corner was the lavvy.....it was a bit of a sod so I was told going down there in the dark on a winters evening....especially if there was a foot of snow. What I do remember fondly about the place was the dairy....and using the butter churn ....,.and the bakery next to it with its large wood fired oven....the place to be I was told on a cold winters day.
Sultan al-Jaber is leading the COP28 talks on climate change.....yet this is the same person who runs a major oil company....(ADNOC).....who intend to increase their oil production over the next few years. There are thousands of delegates at this conference....who between them must of used many tonnes of ....guess what???......FOSSIL FUEL to get there. Have I missed something here ???
It’ll be worth it if it gets the job done. The fact that the world’s largest polluter, China, isn’t engaged with it doesn’t help.
But didn't the USA and China talked recently and decided that COP28 was not necessary to go to for them now ?
Matt cartoon on the front of todays Telegraph. Two old codgers sitting in their club....one says to the other....,."I'm a Telegraph reader...I get it for the camel racing mostly".
TEAR UP EU AND START AGAIN AS MEGA-STATE, SAYS DRAGHI. The European Union should become a single mega-state as it is not working in its current form, according to a former prime minister of Italy. Mario Draghi, who led the European Central Bank (ECB) and served as a technocrat prime minister during the pandemic, said the EU was mired in "functional paralysis" and faced "a critical moment". The former premier said it made no sense to have 27 separate national armed forces and 27 separate drug control agencies. The only hope, he said, would be to have "greater political-integration and a true common parliament". Mr Draghi, who was prime minister of Italy from Feb 2021 until Oct 2022, has hopes of becoming the next president of the European Council, according to Italian media reports. "By expanding the European Union to 28 members (prior to Brexit) we made a colossal error...to think that it could work with the same rules put in place when there were just 12 members," Mr Draghi said in a speech in Rome. For the EU to have a future in a multicentric world dominated by big powers such as the US and China "it should become a state", Mr Draghi said. He added..."Lets hope that those founding values that brought us together will hold us together. Today the growth model has dissolved and we need to reinvent a way of growing, but to do this, we need to become a state." He compared the EU with ancient Rome, lamenting that it has no common foreign policy or single army. Nick Squires...Daily Telegraph...Saturday...02/12/2023. Draghi is certainly not the right man to be saying this....but there must be other more able people in the EU who think the same....and see it as the future. So how long before the formation of the FEDERAL STATES of EUROPE is born......led by Germany and France....heavens forbid.
TBH I’d far rather have an EU passport than be associated with a government that had a home for Suella Braverman and a country parts of which that seem to revere Nigel Farage.
Bleeging heck....first Christmas card arrived today.....don't know what to do with them so early as this.
A private box at the Royal Albert Hall has gone on sale for the first time in 152 years for £3million. The Grand Tier Box 14 , which seats 12 people ...is located in the mirror position of the Kings Box...offering one of the best views in the house for events including the last Night of the Proms. It has been in the family of Brendan Parsons...the 7th Earl of Rosse...since his great-grandfather the 4th Earl got it for £100 when the Concert Hall opened in South Kensington...central London...in 1871. It has 843 years left on its lease and the buyer must pay £13,795 each year as an "annual contribution" towards the venues upkeep. They can make extra cash by selling unwanted tickets back to the box office at face value. Martin Bikhit...of estate agents Berkshire Hathaway Home Services London...said it was "one of the most sought-after spaces in London. Daily Express...Wednesday...06/12/2023. Hurry up notDistant...this is surely the Christmas present that will keep you onside with Mrs notDistant for the coming year.
So the extremists to the right of the Tory party want us not only to threaten the independence of the courts, a ley factor in our democratic process, but also insist on the UK reneging on its international human rights obligations. That’s led to Rwanda to say that if we did the latter, it couldn’t deal with us. So we have Rwanda, yes Rwanda, regarding us as a pariah state. It’s time these people left the Tories and formed their own Fascist Party complete with brown shirts and swastikas.
Further to the above. Vladimir Putin said relations with the UAE had reached unprecedented highs as he was welcomed to the country with a fly past...despite an international warrant for his arrest. His meeting with Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed al-Nahyan...the UAE's president...came as the Kremlin hailed it's "main economic partner in the Arab world" ...the trip is seen as an attempt by Putin to grow alliances with more conservative states as a counterweight to Western efforts to cut off Russia. Daily Telegraph...Thursday...07/12.2023. UAE...Telegraph...Putin...?
