I strongly welcome the cross-party will among Back Benchers to bring this incredibly important issue to the House.
The estimates of how much is lost to the British economy through tax avoidance in its many forms go up to in the region of £120 billion. Lots of people have different figures, but there is no doubt that if we could get on top of the issue—not of tax evasion, when people illegally do not pay their taxes, but of tax avoidance—many of our other debates in this House about the deficit and so on would be skewered. We face a major challenge, as over decades we have reached a situation in which we do not collect the taxes we need to pay for the services we want to provide in the communities we represent. We need to reach some sort of solution so that we can collect those taxes.
It is interesting that in this Back-Bench debate we have heard people from different political parties speaking with one voice. One of the problems in the debate is that for a long time the leaderships of the parties have not had the political courage to take on the multinationals. If we reflect on the speeches we have heard today and read Hansard tomorrow, we will see that it is notable that these companies are household names. They are not the kinds of companies that would move out of Britain. To suggest that Starbucks, Amazon, Vodafone, npower, Google or HSBC will pack up their bags, move away and stop making profits out of our constituents is ludicrous. The reality is not that progress will be made only by the companies themselves. Yes, we need to change the culture in companies. Yes, we need to name and shame. But as politicians we have to change the rules of the debate. That means changes in law so that we are far tougher on those who avoid taxes but also tackle those who evade taxes.