Osborne gets his man

Chris lancashire

This was clearly pre-scripted but a good endorsement of sound financial policies nevertheless.
Conversely, have just heard Balls on Radio5 claiming that Labour reduced the National Debt, that all PFI and associated shenanigans were "on Balance Sheet" (whatever that is) and Labour had started the recovery with better growth, better unemployment - funny, he didn't mention borrowing though. The man is beneath contempt.

Pot Head

I smell a VERY BIG RAT- WPP buys all Government media and therefore the Government has HUGE leverage over them. This is all about politics not economics.

Wight Tory

This is a good start on what I hope is a long term return to Britain being more than run by the financial sector. Let the country take on the challenges of once again making things, quality goods, to go with the marketing companies, the creativeness of this country is staggering, yet it's spent a decade being repressed and held back.

On a different point, but an important one nonetheless, is the media direction being pursued at the moment. GO's job isn't to give everybody a pay rise, though you'd think it was by the TV companies saying, you can't control petrol stations putting the price up, thus making the duty reduction disappear....

The government needs to put across the point that its businesses that pay people and by making the conditions right for them to trade, the price of oil becomes a non-story as they will benefit from increased earning instead. People need to be patient and not expect the government to adopt the attitude that the state will "see them alright" as it did under Labour, which was what got us into this position to begin with.

Yes it hurts, I'm unemployed and not "entitled" to claim any benefit as I was self-employed and paid the "wrong" type of NI contributions. I am looking for work and the way I live is in line with what our home income affords, but without confidence in the business community, there's little chance of getting out of this mess soon.

Well done George on getting the priorities right...

oldtimer

It may persuade others to relocate their HQ back to the UK, but I suspect that the "temporary" 50% rate needs to be abolished too.

But it is not obvious that this budget will encourage serious investment in new facilities in the UK in view of the propensity of the Coalition to vilify and windfall tax businesses that make profits (successful banks like HSBC and North Sea oil and gas companies). The Coalition has also failed to assure a secure, interruption free supply of energy for the future as well as making it more expensive with its carbon tax.

So while the measures will help companies not be taxed on their overseas earnings, overall they do little to help them earn a return on investments in the UK or to encourage new investment. Weak growth, high inflation, an uncertain tax regime, and ballooning government debt remain serious negatives for the UK.

Fatbloke on tour

Trevor

Just what we need at the moment, another froth merchant.

The answer to this is total tax transparency with a breakdown of all the corporation tax paymenst made by the company.

That is explain the difference between pre tax profit and net profit.

Regarding all this nonsense about overseas earnings, if "Squirrel" is wanting special treatment does that mean he is using the UK as a tax haven to "avoid" paying tax in the countries where he works / makes a profit?

Surely all this tax pimping is a race to the bottom by the major economies which will hurt them all in the long term?

The corporate sector needs to pay their fair share of tax, if they don't someone else has to take up the slack or go without.

You have to ask is SpeccyLand the best place to discuss this, just how much corporation tax does the BB's pay on their UK profits?

Less tax from them means less body armour for the guys in A'stan.

Alexander Pelling

No, Fatty. What we need at the moment is less tax, less spending, less regulation, less debt and less government. There would be plenty of money for equipping the troops if the state were rolled back in other areas.

Commentator

I smell a huge rat too. I do not see any of the other companies which have redomiciled rushing to return to the UK. For banks such as Standard Chartered and HSBC, the UK became even less attractive yesterday. The bank levy has been hiked and because most of their profits are generated outside the UK, they are not subject to corporation tax anyway. As one of them put it, the bank levy is simply a surcharge for being UK-headquartered.

Sir Everard Digby

FatBloke,

Corporation tax -should you not direct that question at say,the Guardian,for instance ? Or perhaps ask Tony Blair about his tax arrangements?

Do they pay their 'fair share of tax'?What,may I ask, is a fair share?

Judging by the tax arrangements of those I mentioned, not a lot. Why do they escape your ire I wonder?

Using your logic,that makes them partly responsible for equipment shortages for the troops.That is a facile argument. So where exactly was their unpaid taxes planned to be spent?
Defence? NHS? Anti Dog-Boiling Strategies?

Dimoto

Oldtimer:

Personally, I found the carping witterings of that senior Shell exec. who was all over the airwaves yesterday, very hard to take indeed.

This is a company which is domiciled in the Netherlands, which country, in terms of random green taxes, makes the UK look very ungreen indeed.

The oil companies have been handed a huge increase in revenue, not because there is any shortage in oil supply, but because the spot oil market has become the playground for international speculators (many operating in London).
It's a windfall, they will just give a little back.

It is very puzzling that BP filling stations in the UK are uniformly the most highly priced. No longer "British Petroleum", just BP now, but associated in the mind of most UK retail customers with rip-off Britain.

I guess we'll have to wait for good old Morrisons and Tesco to start the downward pressure on gasoline prices - as usual.

StrongholdBarricades

Under the previous administration almost 75% of those companies listed on the UK stock exchange were domiciled outside UK tax durisdiction.

It is a no-brainer that if you reduce the Tax Rates to be more competitive then these companies will come back if they are mobile enough.

Then even at a lower rate of tax, with more companies paying over the threshold there will be more being paid into the treasury.

Now, however, Osbourne needs to make that cash work harder and generate more companies and jobs so that tax rates can be made much less complex and therefore easier to police, and reduce the burden on "state dependancy"

Pot Head

Corp tax rates are 30% in Germany and they're having an export led recovery, and as far as I know German media giant Bertelsmann hasn't jumped ship to Dublin. I'm not convinced it's always about tax.