Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Stephen Gilbert and Alan Duncan

Wednesday 4th December 2013 Commons Chamber

[Stephen Gilbert (St Austell and Newquay) (LD)]

6. What steps she is taking to increase the capacity of developing countries to collect tax.

[The Minister of State, Department for International Development (Mr Alan Duncan)]

Tax collection is an essential element of any poor country’s development. Last month, DFID announced £6 million of funding for international projects to help poor countries with revenue collection and to combat tax evasion and avoidance.

[Stephen Gilbert]

It might surprise the House that the British overseas territories and Crown dependencies receive more foreign direct investment than Brazil, Russia, India and China combined. What more can we do to ensure that the former jurisdictions are not helping international companies to avoid paying tax to less developed nations?

[Mr Duncan]

At the Lough Erne summit, the Isle of Man, Guernsey and Jersey agreed automatically to exchange tax information on the basis of the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act. All the overseas territories have said that they will conclude similar agreements with the UK. A pilot in the EU is developing the practice further. If accounts are more open and less hidden, poor countries will be in a much better position to raise their own taxes.