In a victory for business transparency, a cross-party call for multinationals to make public where they pay tax and in what places they do business, has been given the nod by the Government.
There has been increasing pressure from politicians and the wider public to hold these huge companies to account. Many people believe these companies purposefully move revenues across the world to avoid paying taxes where they have made a lot of money. It appears that this might be more difficult for these companies in the future.
The ex-chancellor George Osborne agreed with Google to repay £130m in back taxes into the UK coffers and the EU has said that Apple must pay the Irish Government eleven billion pounds in back taxes. Many people sad that Google’s repayment figure was tiny compared to what they should have given to the UK and many called it a “sweetheart deal.”
Labour MP Caroline Flint proposed the amendment, said that these organisations should “play the system denies a fair take for HMRC which impacts on our public services,” and it was “very unfair to those British taxpayers and businesses for whom such complicated organisation of their tax affairs is not an option”.
Fantastic news Govt accepts my Am 145 to enable the introduction of public country-by-country reporting. Thanks everyone. #showmethemoney
— Caroline Flint (@CarolineFlintMP) September 5, 2016