In other news: court case starts over Kenyan violence, an intern pledge and a closed tax loophole

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In other news: court case starts over Kenyan violence, an intern pledge and a closed tax loophole

By Mark Pack | Fri 8th April 2011 - 8:54 am

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The trial of six Kenyans at the International Criminal Court (ICC) over the deaths of 1,200 people following the country’s 2007 elections has started this week.

Ed Miliband has been notably silent over Nick Clegg’s proposals to open up internships to a wider social mix of people. Perhaps that’s because, as LabourList reports, he signed a pre-leadership election pledge that he’s now pretty much ignoring?

The Financial Times reports, “A loophole in the schemes used by wealthy earners to transfer pensions overseas was blocked on Wednesday in a move the Treasury said showed its determination to crack down on avoidance. Officials said action was being taken to close “an unintended tax loophole” arising from a new double-tax treaty with Hong Kong that would have allowed residents of Britain to take tax-free pension payments.”

Read more by Mark Pack or more about ed miliband, international criminal court, kenya, nick clegg or tax.
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2 Comments

Shauny 8th Apr '11 - 9:20am

Wonder how the MilliBalls crew will justify as even the LabourList state, their “Tepid response” to signing the pledge?
John Brace 9th Apr '11 - 8:42am

From my knowledge of most double taxation treaties (knowing a little about the one with America) it works thus:-

Say you are a person based in the UK, but with earnings from America.

In theory these earnings would be taxed by America, then again by the UK. The tax treaty allows you just to pay one country’s taxes rather than being taxed twice (a tax on a tax). In some cases (eg a person based in the UK earning within their personal allowance) this would lead to no tax being paid.

So whereas I can understand a double-taxation treaty on Hong Kong pensions paid to British people or British pensions to those based in Hong Kong meaning the UK government doesn’t pay tax, why wouldn’t the Hong Kong government benefit? Is the tax regime on pensions different in Hong Kong?