Earlier this week, PJ Media reported that the Panama Papers tax scandal that has caused headaches for statesmen worldwide is also causing trouble in Great Britain. According to the released documents, Prime Minister David Cameron’s late father, Ian Cameron, used tax havens to enrich himself and his wealthy friends.
This posed a major problem for the PM because he’s known for lashing out at companies and individuals that use tax havens to dodge taxes at home. Once the name of Ian Cameron was mentioned, however, he quickly became silent, only saying that he considered the family’s finances to be a “private matter.”
Sadly for the PM, that didn’t roll well with the media or his political opponents. And so he was forced to talk about it, eventually admitting that he himself benefited from his father’s business practices. From The Times:
David Cameron admitted last night that he profited from his late father’s offshore investment fund in an unprecedented disclosure of private financial affairs by any prime minister.
Mr Cameron made the admission after days of silence over his links to Blairmore Holdings. Details of the Bahamas-based company set up by Ian Cameron emerged in a leak from a Panamanian law firm on Monday, triggering a row about alleged offshore tax avoidance.
Yesterday Mr Cameron revealed that for 13 years he and his wife, Samantha, held a stake in the fund that was sold for £31,500 just before he became prime minister in 2010.
That’s bad enough for the PM who declared war on tax dodgers years ago, but it gets even worse: interestingly enough, the eventual profit (£19,003) came in at a mere “£300 below the threshold for paying capital gains tax.”
In other words, somehow, the prime minister was able to pocket every single pound without having to pay capital gains tax. If you didn’t know any better, you’d almost think he and his accountant carefully planned for it to be tax free.
As a result of these revelations, politicians of Labour and Cameron’s critics in the media have gone to war with the prime minister. And who can blame them?
Labour MPs called for the prime minister to resign. John Mann accused him of having covered up and misled the public about owning offshore shares. Mr Mann said: “During the 2010 general election campaign Cameron failed to declare offshore shares. Get out now, hypocrite.”
Tom Watson, Labour’s deputy leader, also joined the Cameron-bashing party:
The prime minister has previously described the actions of others who invested in these complex schemes as “morally wrong.” I’m sure he will now consider voluntarily paying the money that, in his own words, should morally belong to the exchequer.
He added:
He may have to resign over this.
What makes it even worse is that the prime minister for days refused to answer any questions about this scandal, giving many people the impression he intended to cover it up. Which he probably did.
If the calls for his resignation increase, Cameron will be in very big trouble indeed. It’d surprise me if he survives this scandal… and if he does, there’s another one hanging right over his head.
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