Hot on the heels of the Christa Ackroyd scandal, the BBC has been accused of industrial-level tax avoidance.
Talent is the BBC's term for the overpaid luvvies that present its television and radio programmes.
Just as we suspected, it has been reported that the BBC pressurised hundreds of these individuals into setting up personal services companies. By paying talent via these companies the BBC could avoid the direct liability of having to pay income tax and National Insurance contributions to HMRC.
HMRC is now demanding millions in back tax from the individuals concerned, who claim the BBC should be footing the bill for encouraging the practise in the first place.
One well-known presenter, speaking to The Sunday Telegraph (subscription), said: "If the BBC held its hands up and said, 'we shouldn't have done this', people would have accepted it.
"But we have sat by for years watching the BBC say this is nothing to do with them, as if we all spontaneously and independently decided to set up personal service companies at the same time.
"This was industrial-level tax avoidance by the BBC. People have been reluctant to speak out because they don't want it to look as if big stars are complaining about paying too much tax. That's not what this is about."
Three presenters - Joanna Gosling, Tim Wilcox and David Eades - are heading to court to challenge a joint tax bill of almost £1m. The trio's preliminary submissions have already indicated that the BBC actively encouraged them to set up personal services companies if they wanted to continue their work for the Corporation.
The BBC, as is regularly the case, denies any wrongdoing.
Is it just us, or does anyone else sense a degree of BBC hypocrisy here? The second any decent, law-abiding person falls even £1 in arrears on their TV licence payments and the BBC threatens to unleash its TV Licensing dogs on them. At the same time, the BBC is actively encouraging hundreds of its own to diddle the taxman of millions of pounds. In effect the BBC is screwing the hardworking British public twice over.
There really has never been a better time to cancel your TV licence.
If you've found this article useful please share it with your friends and consider using our Amazon referral link for your shopping.
3 comments:
If the BBC actually said if you want to get regular word from us then set up an offshore company so we don't have to pay any tax then it isn't there the employee that's at fault it's the BBC and they should pay and receive a huge fine.
The more I learn about the BBC the more revolted I am.
It's clear that the BBC is a greedy and arrogant organisation. They really shouldn't be funded by a tax and they shouldn't be allowed to carry out private prosecutions in England, Wales and Northern Ireland.
Post a Comment