Register to get free articles
Want unlimited access? View Plans
Already have an account? Sign in
Eight tech companies avoided a combined £1.5bn in tax in 2019, according to research conducted by TaxWatch.
The report found that Amazon, eBay, Adobe, Google, Cisco, Facebook, Microsoft, and Apple made an estimated £9.6bn from sales to UK customers in the period.
However, by moving funds out of the UK, the groups were able to declare a fraction of the profits in their UK subsidiary accounts.
In turn, TaxWatch claimed that the eight tech giants “radically” reduced their corporate tax liabilities to £297m in 2019.
George Turner, executive director at TaxWatch, said via ITV News: “It’s outrageous that large multinational giants are moving billions of pounds out of our country and into tax havens or low tax jurisdictions.
“It costs the taxpayer and the Treasury a huge amount of money. For the eight companies we looked at, it costs £1.5bn a year. According to the Institute for Fiscal Studies, that’s enough to fund 40,000 full time nurses for the NHS.”
The report comes as the US is pushing for a global minimum corporate tax rate, meaning that countries can impose the rate on companies headquartered in their jurisdiction on profits that arise overseas.
TaxWatch stated that it would be “in the UK’s interests to seek to negotiate a global minimum rate of taxation as high as 25%” in the current negotiations.
