Benefit Fraud Posters

Bridgeton_Boy

Hi Folks,
Just want to get your thoughts about this. While in town today I saw a number of big posters highlighting the dangers of benefit fraud. With the revelations this last 2 weeks about the Tax avoidance scheme which UK citizens have been using through HSBC and Swiss accounts question I want ask is why are there no posters about the dangers of Tax avoidance and Tax evasion.

Old_Git

Bridgeton_Boy wrote: »

Hi Folks,
Just want to get your thoughts about this. While in town today I saw a number of big posters highlighting the dangers of benefit fraud. With the revelations this last 2 weeks about the Tax avoidance scheme which UK citizens have been using through HSBC and Swiss accounts question I want ask is why are there no posters about the dangers of Tax avoidance and Tax evasion.

tax avoidance is technically still legal .
There is more chance of someone touting on a benefit claimant .Single parent with 3 kids but who is not a single parent ;)

RikM

Old_Git wrote: »

tax avoidance is technically still legal .
There is more chance of someone touting on a benefit claimant .Single parent with 3 kids but who is not a single parent ;)

Nothing "technical" about it. Many methods of avoiding tax are perfectly legal. Salary sacrifice schemes for example.
It's only when they get reclassified as "tax evasion" that they become illegal.

The grey area arises because tax professionals are great at spotting loopholes in the rules. That's only dodgy, because you don't know how the loophole will be treated, when the taxman realises it is there. Avoidance methods the taxman knows about and accepts are perfectly legal.

Targetting benefit fraud is in any case, political. There's not enough of it to really justify a campaign and is bound to net less than closing tax loopholes. But it looks good to politicians of a certain flavour: "we're cracking down on benefit fraud" flies better than "we're going to make sure our chums pay more tax" in those circles...

pc1271

I suppose the difference in attitude is that benefits claimants are taking from the state with little or no contribution, whereas tax avoiders are probably contributing a lot to the state, but not as much as they could/should be.

It's also much easier to prove someone is claiming benefits they're not entitled to than to prove that someone should be paying more tax.

emmett123

Bridgeton_Boy wrote: »

Hi Folks,
Just want to get your thoughts about this. While in town today I saw a number of big posters highlighting the dangers of benefit fraud. With the revelations this last 2 weeks about the Tax avoidance scheme which UK citizens have been using through HSBC and Swiss accounts question I want ask is why are there no posters about the dangers of Tax avoidance and Tax evasion.

Well said BB. One law for us, no law for them:T

emmett123

the dept of work and pensions reckon that £3.5billion is lost through their own mistakes/error and fraud.

the amount lost to the UK, as quoted in the News Statesman, in avoided and evaded tax in £69.9 billion.

It very clear the agenda behind the posters. Rather than turning our anger on the ruling elite who are systematically robbing us, they want (and unfortunately succeed) us to turn on each other. So that we hate upon some guy doing the double etc, rather than wonder why the government ignores a corporation who pay virtual no tax on their mega profits. Trickle down? aye right.

irishjohn

Its not that long ago that HMRC placed full page newspaper ads warning those with offshore bank accounts that there was an amnesty period in place to allow the culprits to declare such accounts and pay their taxes due.

I suspect they chose newspaper ads in favour of street posters because they studied the demographics of the tax avoiders and realised that the newspaper ads were more likely to catch their attention.

Just as street posters are more likely to catch the attention of those committing benefit fraud.

Bridgeton_Boy

Thanks for your views folks. Good to get a cross section of views on this. My own thoughts is that these posters feed into a general PR spin such as with tabloids newspapers,TV media " Benefits Street , Life on the dole etc" to demonize people on benefits.
The resources the government put into investigate benefit fraud totally dwarfs the resources put into tax fraud investigation.
To borrow a quote from Oscar Wilde in relation to this government actions in this regard they "know the cost of everything and the value of nothing"

SailorSam

Coming down heavier on benefit fraud rather than tax fraud is a bit like asking why is it the police seem to put such a lot of resources into setting up a speed trap. You see instances where there may be half-a-dozen or more police with cameras trying to catch speeding motorists while just around the corner the drug dealers or scallies breaking into our houses are left in peace.
I think sometimes the motorist is an easy target, just like the benefit claimant.

Ticked

SailorSam wrote: »

I think sometimes the motorist is an easy target, just like the benefit claimant.

If there were no speed traps and everyone drove at whatever speed they wanted to, many more innocents would be killed. Deterrents are not high enough.

donnac2558

I have seen them popping up, phone and report people or really its tout tout tout.:D