Swanand

This is all bollix so far. The tax loopholes are the ones that companies and wealthy families use. Creating a trust in an offshore location to pay 0% tax is the big one. I'm looking at you Caymans/BVI/Liechtenstein/Monaco and so on and so on and so on.

Case in hand: Philip Green owner of Top Shop in the UK and other retail outlets. Net worth ￡4bn

Lives in London. Owner of his companies: his wife. Wife lives in Monaco and pays ￡0 British tax. Get it now?

There was a great article on the Rausing family, creators of the tetrapak (what your milk comes out of). They set up a charity as the recipient of their companies income - the charity pays 0% on income. The beneficiaries of the charity? Billionaires Guy & Hans Rausing (a bit more complex than this but this is effectively it).

And companies set up their head office in Caymans etc. It is a copper plate on a door. For which they pay... you guessed it... 0% tax.

Is that making the point clearer?