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UK’s Cameron to take tax plan to Parliament; faces grilling

Cameron admitted he had not handled well the revelations about his father’s Blairmore fund following the leak of documents by Panamanian law firm Mossack Fonseca.

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But the document also generated a new round of headlines over a 200,000 pound gift from his mother on which Cameron – legally – paid no tax.

He will announce plans to make it a criminal offence for companies to stop their staff facilitating tax evasion.

He went on to outline a number of ways the Government will pursue aggressive tax avoidance practices as revealed in the Panama Papers and has set up a cross agency task force to analyse and act on any information that shows money is illegally bypassing the UK Treasury.

North of the border, SNP leader Nicola Sturgeon has already published her tax return for 2014/15, and committed to publishing it annually for as long as she is Scotland’s first minister.

Scottish Labour leader Kezia Dugdale, the Conservatives’s Ruth Davidson and Lib Dem Willie Rennie have also published their returns.

But Mr Key has said he complied with the law governing disclosure of financial interests and did not believe it was necessary to release his tax records.

Mr Osborne and Mr Johnson’s tax returns disclosed that they both benefit from lucrative outside earnings to supplement the salaries they receive from their elected offices. Had Mr Cameron received the half a million pounds in one lump sum he would have been liable to pay the inheritance tax because it would have been over the tax threshold of £325,000.

Opposition leaders say they will grill Cameron over his tax affairs when he delivers a parliamentary speech Monday on cracking down on tax evasion.

British police will soon be able to pierce the secrecy of certain tax havens, Prime Minister David Cameron said on Monday, as he sought to defuse pressure over his tax affairs linked to the so-called Panama Papers.

Christian Aid said that the announcement amounted to a “climbdown” on Mr Cameron’s previous support for public registers of companies’ beneficial ownership. “We have yet to hear from George Osborne, or others”, he said. As far as David Cameron’s own interest in the offshore account, The New York Times reports that he is saying he and his wife Samantha sold their portion of the account before he became prime minister in 2010.

“That is why we will legislate this year to hold companies who fail to stop their employees facilitating tax evasion criminally liable, ” he added. I know there are lessons to learn, and I will learn them.

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On 12 May, the PM will host a London Anti-Corruption Summit aimed at stepping up global action to expose, punish and drive out corruption in all walks of life.

Osborne No offshore interests in shares or anything else