British Prime
Minister David Cameron will say on Monday that new legislation making companies
criminally liable if employees aid tax evasion will be introduced this year, as
he seeks to repair the damage from a week of questions about his personal
finances.
Cameron
published tax records on Sunday to try and defuse criticism over his handling
of the fallout from the Panama Papers, in which his late father was mentioned
for setting up an offshore fund.
After
four carefully worded statements in four days, Cameron bowed to pressure and
admitted that he had benefited from selling his share in his father's fund in
2010. He recognized on Saturday that he had mishandled the disclosure.
Cameron
is leading efforts to persuade British voters to stay in the European Union in
a June 23 referendum that the polls suggest will be tight, and the tax row has
raised concerns among the "in" camp that their cause may have been
damaged.
The
prime minister will attempt to regain the upper hand when he appears in the
House of Commons later on Monday.
"This
government has done more than any other to take action against corruption in
all its forms, but we will go further," Cameron will say, according to
advance excerpts of his statement circulated by his Downing Street office.
"That is why we will legislate this year to
hold companies who fail to stop their employees facilitating tax evasion
criminally liable," he will say.
The plan had already been announced by
finance minister George Osborne in March 2015, but previously the commitment
was to introduce the legislation by 2020, Downing Street said.
The decision to speed up that particular
measure is unlikely to satisfy Cameron's many critics in opposition parties and
in some campaign groups that say Britain already has the tools it needs to
crack down on tax evasion but lacks the will.
The government rejects that, saying it has
brought in more than 2 billion pounds ($2.8 billion) from offshore tax evaders
since 2010 and has established a registry of company beneficial ownership
information due to become public in June this year.
The furor over his own finances has come at
a particularly bad time for Cameron, who is due to host a global
anti-corruption summit in London on May 12.
He has also been struggling with deep
divisions in his Conservative Party over EU membership, and the government has
been embarrassed by a senior minister's resignation, a u-turn on welfare cuts
and a crisis in the British steel industry it has failed to resolve.
($1 = 0.7080 pounds)
(Reporting by Estelle Shirbon; Editing by Ros
Russell)
No comments:
Post a Comment