‘Regular guy’s’ finances hidden by offshore secrecy jurisdiction
published this on 12:22 pm, Monday, 21st December, 2009Business| Community News| Politics | Comments (rss) | Respond | Ping |
That ‘regular guy’, former Prime Minister Tony Blair, has a very regular attitude to the vast wealth (over £15 million) he has accumulated since leaving office in 2007 – ‘regular’ for the super-rich, that is.
He has had a complex cobweb of legal entities established to make his financial and business affairs impenetrable. It has been estimated that he is spending around £15,000 a year on tax accountancy bills for the work of putting his income beyond scrutiny.
The Guardian ran an imaginative online competition inviting readers to delve into, discover what they could and analyse Blair’s shadowy finances.
He has a tangle of limited companies, limited liability partnerships and limited partnerships leaving him legally able to avoid publishing accounts.
The Guardian’s analysis is that Blair’s arrangements now offer him the shelter of offshore secrecy jurisdiction while letting him legally claim to be a regular – that word again – onshore British taxpayer. So that’s why he’s spending most of his time abroad these days.
The winner of the Guardian’s competition, Richard Murphy, from the company Tax Research UK, asks a pretty pertinent question:
‘Just what is it that Tony is so keen to hide that he’ll go to this length and this cost to do so?’
We suggest that some investigation around Saudi Arabian connections might be fruitful. Think about it.
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December 21st, 2009 at 12:25 pm
[...] [link to post] > ‘Regular guy’s’ finances hidden by offshore secrecy [...]
December 22nd, 2009 at 4:18 pm
We should be totally cynical about the Chilcot Inquiry.
They are allowing it because it cannot tell us anything we do not already know.
It is being used as a device to scapegoat Tony Blair thus hopefully allowing you-know-who who was totally complicit in the plan to invade Iraq (“as much as it takes”) to get away relatively unscathed as he faces a General Election.
I haven’t forgotten. Nor has any sensible person and we have a duty to humanity ,to honesty, to morality, to democracy and to rule of law worldwide to remind those who may have forgotten
December 22nd, 2009 at 5:44 pm
I’ve read somewhere, maybe on this website, the suspicion that Brown gave Blair the money for Iraq and Afghanistan without a quibble (I remember being surprised at the time because I’d expected him to baulk Blair but he was very quick off the mark with the funds) because he knew the wars were wrong and he thought they’d bring Blair down. The psychology behind this speculation seems spot on. Very Brown. But how corrupt is someone who’ll pay to see God know how many thousands die just to score points off a political rival? The ‘moral compass’ tag was one of the biggest PR frauds.
December 22nd, 2009 at 11:58 pm
Hiyak. Exactly. Couldn’t have put it better myself.