George Osborne's crackdown on Swiss bank accounts may yield £5 billion for Briish taxpayers

By Tim Montgomerie
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For years the "Swiss bank account" has been the refuge for many tax dodgers and criminals. George Osborne claims those times are over:

"Tax evasion is wrong at the best of times, but in economic circumstances like this it means that hard-pressed law-abiding taxpayers are forced to pay even more. That is why this Coalition Government made it a priority to go after those who don’t pay their fair share. We will be as tough on the richest who evade tax as on those who cheat on benefits. The days when it was easy to stash the profits of tax evasion in Switzerland are over."

Richard Murphy, the left-wing tax campaigner, is appalled, however, at what he sees as the inadequacy of the deal announced overnight. He claims that "the accounts of UK taxpayers holding bank accounts in Switzerland who do not want details of their affairs disclosed in the UK will be a few per cent lower than  their UK marginal tax rate." Murphy might be right (I'm far from an expert on these matters) but it's a better deal than Labour ever achieved and The Independent follows the Treasury line in reporting that the deal could net a £5 billion windfall for the UK taxpayer. Explaining what's been agreed the FT (£) writes: 

"Taxes on future income will be withheld at a rate of 48 per cent, corresponding to the top 50 per cent rate that now applies to Britain’s highest earners. A one-off levy of between 19 and 34 per cent will be applied to all Swiss accounts held by UK residents, with the exact percentage to be determined by the size of the deposit and how long it has been maintained."

The full details of the UK-Swiss detail can be read here.

> On ThinkTankCentral today: New TaxPayers' Alliance report finds £27.4 billion in taxes goes uncollected.