[Chris]

Radio 1 DJ Chris Moyles has had an attempt to keep his involvement in a tax-avoidance scheme out of the public eye rejected by a high court judge.

Though there is no suggestion that Moyles acted illegally, The Times reports that the former Breakfast Show host was paying a nominal amount of tax and had attempted to gag the press from reporting this fact. It is not clear if he sought to avoid tax on BBC earnings, something which would be breach of his reported £500,000 annual contract with the public-funded corporation.

Moyles' bid to silence the press was described by his lawyer as being motivated by the fact his career might be damaged through the subsequent bad publicity, and that his earning capacity would be reduced. Judge Colin Bishop summed up the case by stating that: “If it were to become public knowledge that he availed himself of a tax avoidance scheme, his career might be damaged and his earning capacity reduced. He is already the focus of media interest for other reasons, much of it hostile."

However, he continued to reject Moyles' bid for privacy, saying: "The fact that a taxpayer is rich, or that he is in the public eye, does not seem to me to dictate a different approach. On the contrary, it may be that hearing the appeal of such a person in private would give rise to the suspicion that riches or fame can buy anonymity, and protection from the scrutiny which others cannot avoid.”

Join our lively discussion on the topic here: http://u.chrismoyles.net/tax

(from The Times, NME and many other sources)

[Dark Horizon]

One should say "allegedly" when making such references; one must be careful when associating the word involvement in what could be construed as a criminal act by association based on public accusation; with a person that has to all intents and purpose not breached any laws or statutes nor attempted to knowingly do so; or that it has not been proven that it was done so by personal action to circumvent a legal threshold. All tax schemes are in fact legal until HMRC say that they are not, so there is no evidence of wrong doing that I can see based on this one report.
Also the judge in this case failed to take this into account; This all sounds like prevarication on a theme of "I'm a judge and can do what I want" No one can't as one will find out if it is proven that there was not any attempt by the aforementioned of abuse or wrong doing in the use of Tax law and exemption in order to pay nominal amounts of tax.

These witch hunts at this time are hardly helpful, perhaps judges should publicly declare whither they are adherent to such schemes themselves, since they are in the public eye, doctors too and politicians. Of course those august personages would deem it not in the public interest that their activities became public.

I doubt that Chris Moyles had any direct input into any tax scheme, that’s what accountants are paid for, we don’t usually have an accountant checking our accountants in order to make sure we are entirely squeaky clean in the areas of tax. We depend on those we hire to to the job they are paid for.

The answer is simple really get HMRC to do the job they are paid for and close any loop holes, I think chris moyles mistake was not having the Head of HMRC round for lunch, which is the best way of making tax problems go away. On record its the most effective way of writing off billions of pounds in unpaid tax, because its not in the public interest to collect it.

I suggest Chris opens a nationwide Radio station and broadcasts on it for charity and gets others to contribute charitably with their time to raise awareness of certain charities and good causes, which would of course make for a highly legitimate reason for reducing ones tax bill. Also helping a lot of disadvantaged people.

[chrysostom]

One should say "allegedly" when making such references; one must be careful when associating the word involvement in what could be construed as a criminal act by association based on public accusation

When you're republishing content that has been backed up by fact it's not quite the same, there's lots more I could say about how you've read avoidance ad evasion but I stopped reading after this sentence due to the high concentration of inaccuracy.

Zzz...

[The Deadly]

It was a great bump though. You have to give him that.

I'm giving his post 6/10