Practitioner pressure

Tim Friedman consultant Sagars chartered accountants Leeds writes...

As tax practitioners know rather more about the facts than untrained so-called investigative journalists I think we should protest about the way some of the media are misrepresenting tax avoidance and are seeking to “name and shame” those “avoiders” they have identified.

First we must stress that tax avoidance is entirely legal (as opposed to tax evasion which is not) and that almost everyone indulges in it when they can. Further there are judicial dicta to confirm they are entitled to do so.

Second we must stress that the decision as to how much of our income should be paid over to central government and how much we should be allowed to keep for ourselves is a political rather than moral one.

The laws that we and our clients must...