Tax Update

摘要

British business and the government are to form a new working group on tax. The move follows news that Pharmaceuticals group Shire and publisher United Business Media were moving their tax base to Ireland, with other large companies threatening to follow suit. In i speech in April, chancellor Alistair Darling set out plans for a new group to be chaired by financial secretary Jane Kennedy. The forum will discuss ways in which the tax system 'can provide the long-term certainty that multinational companies need in the face of increased competitiveness and other global challenges facing both business and government'. The group will bemade up of eight multinational executives. They include: Julian Heslop, chief financial officer of GlaxoSmithKline, which recently declared it had no plans 'at present' to relocate its headquarters; Douglas Flint, group finance director of HSBC; Hanif Lalani, group finance director of BT; James Lawrence, CFO of Unilever; Andrew Shilston, CFO of Rolls Royce, Byron Grote, CFO of BP; Nicolas Moreau, group chief executive of Axa UK and Ireland, and; Duncan Tatton-Brown, group FD of Kingfisher. They will be joined by four leading economists and Richard Lambert, director-general of the CBI.