German paper accuses UK of offshore tax haven threat

TheLocal.de ^ | 15 January 2017 21:55 CET+01:00 | AFP/The Local

[Olog-hai]

Germany’s Welt Am Sonntag newspaper has accused British finance minister Phillip Hammond of threatening to drastically slash corporation tax to turn the UK into an offshore tax haven if it is not given a trade deal.

In an interview with Hammond, headlined “British finance minister threatens EU partners”, the paper quotes Hammond saying that Britain could be forced to change its economic model if negotiations went badly.

“The British people are not going to lie down and say, ‘too bad’,” he said, when asked if the UK could slash corporation taxes. “If we have no access to the European market, if we are closed off”, then short-term economic damage could follow, but Britain would then be forced to change its model “to regain competitiveness”.

In the interview Hammond argued that Britain and the EU should reach a deal allowing reciprocal access to each other’s markets — although he stressed that London could not compromise on regaining immigration control. …

[Olog-hai]

So that’s the way Germany and the EU want to play it: anyone with a lower corporate tax rate and fewer regulations gets branded a “tax haven” and the EU starts a trade war with them.

[DesertRhino]

Well kraut, if they do, you know what you could do? You could just cut taxes even deeper!

(but that’s no fun, is it? )

Bastards all!

[truth_seeker]

The Channel Islands are already a tax haven. Have been for a long while.

Certain Caribbean members of the Commonwealth of Nations are also longstanding and well known tax havens.

The Republic of Ireland is, to a certain extent, a tax haven.

Each countries’ tax laws stand alone, as do the tax havens.

Germany should mind their own business.

[ARGLOCKGUY]

The Germans can’t mind their own business. They seem to have a deep seated need to tell others what to do.