Combatting Offshore Tax Evasion After Brexit EmilDuvessa SondajBandeen, Han Juliette Bowen, Mark O’Brien, Will Melling and Zeki Dolen Emil Sondaj Hansen,
to vote, has deprived them of this status. Some in the OTs have worried that this has set a precedent for the neglect of their interests in favour of those of the metropole.84
In light of this, SAMLA appears less of an isolated incident and more a part of a trend that has caused significant consternation in the OTs. Politicians in those OTs with the biggest offshore financial centres, such as the British Virgin Islands or the Cayman Islands, reacted strongly against the law, accusing the UK of overreaching on a purely financial matter that ought to remain devolved.85 Indeed, even the Chief Minister of the more compliant Gibraltar labelled it an ‘unacceptable act of modern day colonialism’.86 This, then, is one of the central issues that explains Britain’s policy towards tax evasion and tax havens. Britain’s initial support was in part a result of the FCO’s desire to provide OTs with a viable path to economic development; whereas a 2019 Foreign Affairs Select Committee report on Britain’s relationship with the OTs came down strongly in favour of prioritising Britain’s ‘national security’ over the objections of OT politicians.87 The second half of the 2010s has seen Britain shift towards adopting and enforcing anti-evasion measures, including as they relate to the CDs and OTs. Though Britain must remain wary of overreaching and opening itself up to accusations of neo-colonialism in taking this harder line.
I.IV THE EU AND TAX EVASION
In order to understand the space available for new British approaches to tax evasion, it is important to understand exactly what the UK is ‘leaving behind’ following Brexit. The paper now turns to the measures that the European Union has implemented in the fight against tax evasion. In recent decades, increasing attention in the EU has been paid to the issue of tax
84
ibid., 158–159.
85
House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee, Global Britain and the British Overseas Territories: Resetting the Relationship, 13–14.
86
Hakeem O Yusuf and Tanzil Chowdhury, ‘The Persistence of Colonial Constitutionalism in British Overseas Territories’ (2019) 8 Global
Constitutionalism 157, 158. 87
House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee, Global Britain and the British Overseas Territories: Resetting the Relationship, p 14.
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www.thewilberforcesociety.co.uk
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February 2021
