Starbucks to Reconsider UK Tax Arrangements

*Photo courtesy of scotsman.com

From scotsman.com:

"STARBUCKS is to review its tax affairs as the government today announced a drive to crack down on tax avoidance by multinationals.

• Coffee giant has paid just £8.6m in corporation tax in 14 years of trading in the UK


• Starbucks has paid no corporation tax for the past three years, despite sales of £1.2bn in the UK


• Government announces additional investment to clamp down on multinational tax avoidance schemes

The coffee chain, which has suffered a consumer backlash, said in a statement that it is in talks with the HMRC and the Treasury over its tax affairs.

“Starbucks is committed to the UK for the long term and we have invested more than £200m in our UK business over the past 12 years,” the statement said.

“Starbucks has complied with all the tax laws in this country but has regretfully not been as profitable as we would have liked.

“We have listened to feedback from our customers and employees, and understand that to maintain and further build public trust we need to do more.

Crackdown

George Osborne is set to announce extra investment to crack down on tax avoidance by global companies with British operations.

The Chancellor plans to bolster the Inland Revenue team that deals with multinationals amid widespread condemnation of big-name firms like Starbucks, Google, and Amazon after it emerged they pay little or no corporation tax in the UK.

Mr. Osborne told BBC 1’s Andrew Marr Show: “I think you can do two things. One is you can enforce the taxes we have got and I am going to be announcing tomorrow extra investment in the part of the Inland Revenue that tackles tax avoidance by multinational companies.

“Second, you make sure internationally we have the right rules and it is actually Britain who has been working with Germany and France to get those rules on the international table.

“It will be a big priority for the G7, G8, which we host next year.

“So we are doing those things but let me just say we can’t tackle this by pricing Britain out of the world economy. If we make our taxes less competitive that will just mean more companies stay out of Britain.”