Individual tax dodgers deprived UK of £100 bn in revenue

People avoiding payment of taxes by stashing their money in tax havens could have contributed enough to end extreme poverty across the world twice over, according to a charity.

According to calculations by charity Oxfam,  an international confederation of 17 organisations in over 90 countries, it was individuals, rather than companies, that had deprived government of £100 billion in revenue.

It also accused the government of failure in tackling the issue of UK tax havens, even as it talked tough about avoidance of corporate tax.

Multinational firms including Apple, Amazon and Starbucks had been slammed for the amount of tax they had paid, despite making massive profits.

Prime minister David Cameron is expected to call for global tax system reforms at an EU summit in Brussels today.

In a letter to his EU counterparts, Cameron called on European governments to join forces to act against "staggering" losses from tax evasion as also "aggressive avoidance" with the adoption of a US system of cross-border tax information exchange.

A system of the kind was already under joint testing by  UK, Germany, France, Spain and Italy and would be implemented by the end of this year.

The prime minister also wrote to UK overseas territories and crown dependencies two days ago telling them he expected action from their side on tax transparency.

According to Oxfam, the final amount of lost revenue could be far higher given that the figure was based on individuals and did not include corporations.

A high proportion of tax evasion happened in British territories which contained over a third of the £12 trillion held in havens around the globe, Oxfam added.

According to Emma Seery, Oxfam's head of development finance and public services, UK was at the centre of a tax system that was 'a betrayal of people in the UK and also in the poorest countries'.

She added, David Cameron and George Osborne continued to tour the world making promises to clamp down on tax havens, but had so far done absolutely nothing to make tax deals work for poor countries.

Oxfam is calling for the creation of a blacklist by the EU of tax havens and clear sanctions for those who breached the rules.

According to Oxfam over a third of the £12 trillion held in tax havens by individuals around the globe was believed to be in British Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies.

(Also see: Tax on the ''private'' billions stashed in havens would end extreme world poverty twice over)