Sir Alex Ferguson among hundreds ordered to pay back TWENTY times their investment in tax scheme

send them to jail too

Excellent news.

Ferguson the "socialist" given a knighthood by Blair at the behest of Alastair Campbell says it all

Qoute from the article: Hundreds of celebrities claim they face bankruptcy after officials demanded repayments of up to 20 times the amount invested in a tax avoidance scheme.

One wants to know. Which auction house will be selling off their unrotten gains and treasures? Be grand time to, go bargain hunting for quality products.

Stuff Black Friday!

“P.S Ferguson” should have known better, mind you he is, imbed with the “Coolmore” tax avoidance racket!

Shurely Fergiescum should be stripped of his knighthood ?

I'd certainly consider it in their position.

So rich, thick footballers who can't even count their own wages let alone read the Financial Times face ruin, while the agents, bankers, lawyers and accountants who got them into this mess just move on to the next scheme and the next victims.

Welcome to 21st Century Britain, where the Establishment takes care of its own, much like every other century.

there not that thick to realise that instead of paying 500 grand a year tax they,ve been paying less than their gardener no ones that thick

i,m sure that if its made clear the alternative is 5 yrs in the big house,they,ll soon remember they,ve got some money under the bed

thx johnny

xmoneyx

Lester Piggott wasn't nearly this bad

Lester should never have gone to jail for that, he wasn't a danger to anybody on the street, a massive fine should have been his punishment. Although he did have a chance to come clean and repay the tax.....but the cheque he signed was on an undeclared bank account and then the taxman knew he still hadn't declared everything and took him to court.

And what about Ken Dodd, avoiding tax and hiding loads of money in his house, he didn't go to jail - although Ken Dodd acted in court.... and avoided prison.

Be interesting to see what happens to Sir Alex Ferguson......

Why can't everyone pay tax like the ordinary working person or is that being naive or foolish?

Glen Hoddle is named as well.
Does this mean he will be coming back as an earthworm ?

What about the billions the wealthy do pay ?

44% of Britons pay no tax at all.

The richest 1% pay 27% of all of the income tax collected,

meaning 300,000 people pay a quarter of the nations income tax.

No matter what the rest of us may think they probably feel that they more than pay their "fair share".

The country would be pretty well stuffed without them.

well if firms and companies payed above the minimum wage there wouldnt make such large profits and so would have less tax to pay company and personal,3 of the countrys biggest money spinners football,sport in general,retail and services restraunts all helped in their profits by millions of people working for the minimum wage or in le roux and ashleys case less than the minimum wage with no  chance of employees going up the ladder,how can clubs like arsenal,chelski,utd earning millllions justify paying 1000,s of staff the same rate as staff at hartlepool,barnet etc,same as dodge taxing barlow and take that paying minimum wage to stewards,caterers etc at their gigs,le roux getting loons to part with 500 quid to a grand for a meal and paying his staff less than the local greasy spoon

Exposed: the hundreds of City millionaires in film tax loophole

Wealthy traders and bosses joined football stars in scheme shut down by the taxman

   by  Lucy Tobin, Jim Armitage
   
    Tuesday 24 April 2012
 

The Independent Online

Hundreds of highly paid City bankers and chief executives make up the vast majority of members of a tax avoidance scheme at the centre of a crackdown by the Revenue.

Coverage of Eclipse 35, which was ruled against in a tax tribunal this week, has focused on Manchester United manager Sir Alex Ferguson, former England boss Sven Goran Eriksson and Nobby Solano, the ex-Newcastle United player.

But it is the vast swathe of City traders, hedge fund managers and private equity advisers which stand out, giving a rare insight into how the financial world's richest players shield their assets from the taxman.

Of the nearly 300 names in the list of members, of those whose identities are traceable, there were 11 managers at Deutsche Bank, 10 former and current[b] Goldman Sachs bankers, eight traders and managers at UBS, and more than 25 hedge fund managers from big firms including Brevan Howard and Walker Crips.
Other banks whose staff feature repeatedly include Citibank, Barclays Capital, the broker Icap, JP Morgan and RBS.

Most of the City whizzkids involved appear to be traders or heads of departments likely to be earning hundreds of thousands of pounds a year, such as Stefan Tsonev, a managing director at JP Morgan, Magid Shenouda at Goldman Sachs, and Raymond Key of Deutsche. None was willing or available for comment.

Also appearing is Philippa Rose, sometimes claimed to be the most powerful headhunter in the City. She declined to comment on her investment in the scheme.

But this is just the tip of the iceberg, as many of the members of Eclipse 35 had common names that made their identification impossible.

Accountancy experts said dozens of similar schemes were in operation.

The murkiness of this particular scheme was highlighted this week, when HMRC barred Eclipse 35 from claiming tax relief on a £1bn tie-up with Disney. The relief would have been worth £404,000 for each of the high-net worth individuals involved who invested on average £173,000.

A spokeswoman for UK Uncut said the revelations showed "big businesses and bankers are profiting from everyone else's economic woes by cutting their tax bills."

Elsewhere, the taxman is currently investigating another film partnership, Ingenious Film Partners 2 LLP, in which City bigwigs including Centrica chief executive Sam Laidlaw and Dick Olver, chairman of the defence giant BAE, were investors for at least four years.

The wealthy investors involved in Eclipse 35 come from particular pockets of the country – many stem from Manchester's business community – and particular sectors at banks, which Mr Marum said was down to word-of-mouth recommendations as well as the wealthy sharing financial advisers.

How eclipse 35 worked

Barclays lent £790m to the film partnership, and its 289 members then topped out the pot with £50m of their own funds.
Just over £500m of that cash was then paid to Disney for rights to its films Enchanted and Underdog.
The scheme paid out £293m to Barclays for a decade-worth of interest payments for its original loan, and licensed the rights to the films back to Disney, at a rate of return of £1.02bn for 20 years.
Eclipse was then claiming £117m in tax relief from the Revenue, due to its payout to Barclays. That would work out at an average £404,000 tax relief per investor, providing about £1m-worth of tax-free earnings.
But this week HMRC acted to block the tax relief before it was paid out.

I'll rephrase, 44% of working age adults pay no income tax at all.

Define "fair share" .....

I thought I had defined it earlier. By simply paying their percentage in the same way as ordinary working people. The government has set this at 45% of earnings above the tax free allowance.