BG - WebberG farewell. Right to reply.

[eek]

I hadn't realised that.

If I was a BG member, I'd be puzzled as to why WTT isn't a part of this.

If you had a court date of 2020/1 (say) well after all the other cases have gone to court why would you need to know the outline arguments of the other cases when you would be able to hear / see the actual arguments in court.

[huntingground]

I know who Webberg is and the company he works for and how to contact them. At one point he asked me via CUK to put him in touch with the PCG team at that time. He has contributed much to the awareness and understanding of the whole set of issues around the tax avoidance arena.

I have no idea who Saleos is nor who he represents*. I've not seen any positive contributions from him (or, come to that, his supporting cohort) other than warning people to stay away from BG on the slightly specious grounds that BG are somehow defrauding their clients.

I'm not taking sides, and am a disinterested observer of the whole exercise, but driving Webberg away from CUK is not, in my view, a beneficial or desirable move.



*Of course, I am happy to be told...

Who we are | Armadillo Support

Saleos is Matt Hall. He was involved in peddling loan schemes back in the day.

[Saleos]

If you had a court date of 2020/1 (say) well after all the other cases have gone to court why would you need to know the outline arguments of the other cases when you would be able to hear / see the actual arguments in court.

I'd suggest that you are looking at this from the wrong point of view Eek.

What people are saying is that if there are indeed other arguments that have the claimed 65% of success would it not be better for everyone if they were deployed in those preceding cases? After all, if HMRC defeat those cases, whether or not the FTT will be bound, HMRC very clearly argue it should be. And 3 cases lost to HMRC would certainly make an already uphill battle for WTT/BG an even greater mountain to climb. And allow HMRC to issue FN's& APN's to those awaiting the summit in the meantime.

All others (Higgs, Hoey, Lancashire) have already swapped skeletons. One keeps their cards firmly to their chest.

A question I have asked repeatedly is who benefits from arguments that HMRC must, on WebberG's own statement, already know, being kept hidden (including largely from clients)? Or put another way, what are they afraid of?

[Saleos]

Who we are | Armadillo Support

Saleos is Matt Hall. He was involved in peddling loan schemes back in the day.

Well done Sherlock.

It isn't a secret that I worked for a firm that devised a loan scheme 15+ years ago that I am still defending. Now for free.

[DealorNoDeal]

A question I have asked repeatedly is who benefits from arguments that HMRC must, on WebberG's own statement, already know, being kept hidden (including largely from clients)? Or put another way, what are they afraid of?

The only two explanations I can come up with are:

1) They don't want to share their intellectual property (eg. legal advice their clients have paid for) with anyone else. I guess that would be fair enough.

or

2) They haven't got anything compelling, and they don't want other advisors/lawyers seeing that. Obviously this couldn't remain hidden forever because once it goes to an FTT it becomes public knowledge.

[malvolio]

Who we are | Armadillo Support

Saleos is Matt Hall. He was involved in peddling loan schemes back in the day.

Thanks. Another two man consultancy then...

I note no company information on the website and the contact address is their accountants (although that is not unusual...). Heigh ho.

[luxCon]

The only two explanations I can come up with are:

1) They don't want to share their intellectual property (eg. legal advice their clients have paid for) with anyone else, including their own clients who paid for these. I guess that would be fair enough.

..

[eek]

..

Are you currently a Big Group member?

[luxCon]

Are you currently a Big Group member?

No, But I know a handful of people who are and I've spoken to them

[DealorNoDeal]

No, But I know a handful of people who are and I've spoken to them

Re. the following from webberg's farewell message.

(1) Have the people you know been fully briefed as webberg says?

(2) Have they seen a skeleton argument submitted as part of the WTT's FTT application?

-------------

Will we share those? Yes, at the appropriate time and with the appropriate parties. The appropriate time/parties are when asked by a client: when in conference with Counsel: when directed by a Tribunal. (1) Our clients remain fully briefed of our arguments through provision of several technical papers, countless webinars and ongoing updates. To suggest they don’t know what they’re paying for does them a disservice. We encourage clients to do their research and arrive at an informed decision before joining us.

(2) A few months ago HMRC attempted to stop one of our cases by citing Hoey and arguing that we would be repeating the arguments. Therefore, HMRC claimed, we should be “stayed” behind the final decision in Hoey. Our counter to that argument was subject to a “direction” from Judge Gillett – the same Judge who decided the Hoey case at FTT. Judge Gillett refused HMRC’s application and indicated that our action should proceed as it was raising points not discussed in Hoey. We consider that proof enough that our arguments differ sufficiently from those in Hoey.