Croydon incinerator firm Viridor avoids thousands of pounds of tax
THE multimillion-pound waste firm claiming it will save Croydon taxpayers money by building an incinerator on the borough's border has avoided thousands of pounds' worth of tax.
Viridor – the company planning the plant – joins a host of conglomerates including Starbucks, Amazon and Google, which have benefited from international arrangements at taxpayers' expense.
The firm, which has avoided up to £100,000 – equivalent to more than £500 per Croydon household – this week confirmed it avoided paying Stamp Duty via a subsidiary company it owns in the British Virgin Islands – an offshore tax haven.
It previously refused to publish its tax history after we last year revealed one of its large facilities in Sheffield is owned by the offshore-registered subsidiary.
Business Cards From Only £10.95 Delivered www.myprint-247.co.uk
View detailsOur heavyweight cards have FREE UV silk coating, FREE next day delivery & VAT included. Choose from 1000's of pre-designed templates or upload your own artwork. Orders dispatched within 24hrs.
Terms: Visit our site for more products: Business Cards, Compliment Slips, Letterheads, Leaflets, Postcards, Posters & much more. All items are free next day delivery. www.myprint-247.co.uk
Contact: 01858 468192
Valid until: Friday, May 31 2013
But the Advertiser has since established that Viridor benefited from buying the Sheffield site for £20.6 million from a company already based in the tax haven.
A company spokesman said: "Viridor confirms that some shares in this particular acquisition were purchased in a foreign company, meaning, in accordance with UK tax law, that they did not attract Stamp Duty."
According to the firm's latest accounts, Viridor Parkwood Holdings Limited, a subsidiary controlled by Viridor Limited and which can receive bulk funds, is still based in the British Virgin Islands.
When asked why the arrangement remains in place, the company provided no further comment.
By taking over the Parkwood company in 2002, while it was already based in the tax haven, Viridor avoided paying 0.5 per cent Stamp Duty on the amount of the shares bought to purchase it – an amount that would have been due were it based in the UK.
The company refused to say how much in total this saved them, but buying the offshore company for £20.6 million means they could have saved up to £103,000.
Phil Thomas, Croydon Council's cabinet member for waste collection and recycling, said: "Everyone should pay their fair share of tax irrespective of whether they are an individual person or a company doing business here.
"They shouldn't look for tax havens."
Croydon Green Party's Shasha Khan, who fiercely opposes the incinerator plan, said: "Viridor spends tens of thousands on public relations companies to help positively spin their waste incinerators.
"This revelation exposes the culture behind the brand."
Viridor claims the incinerator – designed to reduce the amount of waste Croydon, Sutton, Merton and Kingston are sending to landfill – will save taxpayers from the four boroughs £200 million over the next 25 years, despite landfill rates having fallen 17 per cent.
Prevailing winds mean Croydon residents will inhale more of the incinerator's emissions than those in any other borough.
As a result, Croydon residents' objections will hold equal weight during the consultation period.
3 Comments
by Chris_Wilcox
Wednesday, February 27 2013, 3:29PM
“We need to change the Tax laws. If you make the money in this country you pay Tax in this country NO MATTER WHERE YOU ARE BASED.
That'll shut them down good and proper.”
by Smogbadnew2
Wednesday, February 27 2013, 1:33PM
“The world of air pollution and the world of planet wide waste do seem to be meeting.
Last week was the Parliamentary premier of the new film Trashed,with Jeremy Irons,at Portcullis House. Now it is to be sown in Croydon.
It is about (amongst other things) incinerators, ultrafine particles that reached the brain and the cancer dangers of dioxins (specifically made by burning chlorinated plastics). Zac Goldsmith said that it was impossible to regulate something as simple as the plastic bag because of the intense lobbying of Parliament by the industry, warning of the Treasury's interference with the plastic bag levy.
It's up to you,he said !!!
Trash could also have added the "ordinary" mortality and morbidity, so evident in London and Croydon, from traffic pollution.Each incinerator adds a large transport "train" of diesel lorries to the local roads, as well as large amounts of toxic gases and particulates on its own account.
Last week's 2013 WHO report examining the extra new dangers of London air pollution needs came out as well, coincidentally. It highlighted the importance of spikes of pollution, also confirmed by the recent King's report. These start the very damaging, autonomous, inflammatory reactions that include the placenta (see ozone section of WHO Europe)
King's
Population exposures...see particularly schoolchildren and toddlers
http://tinyurl.com/boq49e3
WHO 2013
(press release)
http://tinyurl.com/acakvcc
(initial report)
http://tinyurl.com/bfp48pj
With Diesel traffic already at increased levels in outer London, and the extra lorries the Sutton incinerator will bring, the health of the whole north of the boroughs of Sutton and Croydon is being put at risk.
.
Recent researches have thrown a spotlight on heart attack induction and post heart attack survival and air pollution .The London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (by the way, this is a domestic repeat of US research published last year) had a representative on BBC London news last week. The relevant researcher mentions INFLAMMATION as the core mechanism for early deaths and then reinfarction.
Here are some non-BBC sources:
http://tinyurl.com/b5hgsgu
http://tinyurl.com/asa2pwg
http://tinyurl.com/bk4ungj
The real point is that the mechanisms of inflammation are very powerful,extensive and very little known to the lay person.So brain,placenta,heart and lungs may appear not to be connected.
I hope this news item will start its own "cascade"...it follows the news on pregnancies of last week, and brain is soon to follow,no doubt.
http://tinyurl.com/ajterow
All the chickens are coming home to roost.”
by Smogbadnew2
Wednesday, February 27 2013, 1:31PM
“The world of air pollution and the world of planet wide waste do seem to be meeting.
Last week was the Parliamentary premier of the new film Trashed,with Jeremy Irons,at Portcullis House. Now it is to be sown in Croydon.
It is about (amongst other things) incinerators, ultrafine particles that reached the brain and the cancer dangers of dioxins (specifically made by burning chlorinated plastics). Zac Goldsmith said that it was impossible to regulate something as simple as the plastic bag because of the intense lobbying of Parliament by the industry, warning of the Treasury's interference with the plastic bag levy.
It's up to you,he said !!!
Trash could also have added the "ordinary" mortality and morbidity, so evident in London and Croydon, from traffic pollution.Each incinerator adds a large transport "train" of diesel lorries to the local roads, as well as large amounts of toxic gases and particulates on its own account.
Last week's 2013 WHO report examining the extra new dangers of London air pollution needs came out as well, coincidentally. It highlighted the importance of spikes of pollution, also confirmed by the recent King's report. These start the very damaging, autonomous, inflammatory reactions that include the placenta (see ozone section of WHO Europe)
King's
Population exposures...see particularly schoolchildren and toddlers
http://tinyurl.com/boq49e3
WHO 2013
(press release)
http://tinyurl.com/acakvcc
(initial report)
http://tinyurl.com/bfp48pj
With Diesel traffic already at increased levels in outer London, and the extra lorries the Sutton incinerator will bring, the health of the whole north of the boroughs of Sutton and Croydon is being put at risk.
.
Recent researches have thrown a spotlight on heart attack induction and post heart attack survival and air pollution .The London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (by the way, this is a domestic repeat of US research published last year) had a representative on BBC London news last week. The relevant researcher mentions INFLAMMATION as the core mechanism for early deaths and then reinfarction.
Here are some non-BBC sources:
http://tinyurl.com/b5hgsgu
http://tinyurl.com/asa2pwg
http://tinyurl.com/bk4ungj
The real point is that the mechanisms of inflammation are very powerful,extensive and very little known to the lay person.So brain,placenta,heart and lungs may appear not to be connected.
I hope this news item will start its own "cascade"...it follows the news on pregnancies of last week, and brain is soon to follow,no doubt.
http://tinyurl.com/ajterow
All the chickens are coming home to roost.”