I congratulate all those who are working to get international agreements to tackle this problem, including the British Government.
The reality is that we also have to look at what we are doing here and now. Since 2005, we have lost 37,000 jobs in HMRC. We expect to lose another 10,000 tax inspectors by 2015. No doubt the Government will come back and say that there are slight increases in the numbers of staff in specialist and criminal investigations, but they are only one part of the team that looks at all these issues. We have to highlight clearly the use of tax havens by FTSE companies—98 out of the top 100 use them. We have to say that roughly one in five of the world’s tax
havens are the responsibility of the UK and that the use of those tax havens is estimated to cost the UK £18.5 billion a year. These issues need to be tackled internationally, but we have a lot to do at home.
We need to build a consensus in all political parties that we need tax laws which ensure that multinationals pay their due in this country. Unless we do that, a lot of the other debates in this place, whether on legal aid or how we fund hospitals or education, are nonsense. We need the money to go forward. Perhaps one of the things that comes out of this financial crisis will be a recognition that all parts of society must make their contribution. Some of the companies that we have been talking about today should be at the top of the list for ensuring that we all pay our way.
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