UK Uncut was a network of United Kingdom-based protest groups established in October 2010 to protest against cuts to public services and

tax avoidance Tax avoidance is the legal usage of the tax regime in a single territory to one's own advantage to reduce the amount of tax that is payable. A tax shelter is one type of tax avoidance, and tax havens are jurisdictions that facilitate reduced taxe ...

in the UK. Various sources have described the group as

left-wing Left-wing politics describes the range of Ideology#Political ideologies, political ideologies that support and seek to achieve social equality and egalitarianism, often in opposition to social hierarchy either as a whole or of certain social ...

in its political orientation.

History

The idea of UK Uncut originated in October 2010 with a group of ten activists in a north London pub who claimed that clamping down on tax avoidance would be a credible alternative to public sector spending cuts. ''

Private Eye ''Private Eye'' is a British fortnightly satirical and current affairs (news format), current affairs news magazine, founded in 1961. It is published in London and has been edited by Ian Hislop since 1986. The publication is widely recognised ...

'' had recently published an article alleging that

Vodafone Vodafone Group Public Limited Company () is a British Multinational company, multinational telecommunications company. Its registered office and global headquarters are in Newbury, Berkshire, England. It predominantly operates Service (economic ...

had reached a highly favourable settlement of a long-standing tax dispute with

HM Revenue and Customs His Majesty's Revenue and Customs (commonly HM Revenue and Customs, or HMRC, and formerly Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs) is a department of the UK government responsible for the collection of taxes, the payment of some forms of stat ...

so they organised a protest against a store on

Oxford Street Oxford Street is a major road in the City of Westminster in the West End of London, running between Marble Arch and Tottenham Court Road via Oxford Circus. It marks the notional boundary between the areas of Fitzrovia and Marylebone to t ...

. Protesters met at Piccadilly and successfully closed the store.

Tactics and targets

The group uses

direct action Direct action is a term for economic and political behavior in which participants use agency—for example economic or physical power—to achieve their goals. The aim of direct action is to either obstruct a certain practice (such as a governm ...

to disrupt the business of high street stores and banks that they believe have a connection with tax avoidance. Actions are organised independently by local UK Uncut groups and promoted through the UK Uncut website.

was targeted after ''

'' alleged that a deal they made with

substantially reduced the amount of back taxes that they had to pay. Private Eye alleged that Vodafone were originally found liable for £6 billion, but negotiated the amount to be paid down to under £2 billion. However, the National Audit Office said that the settlement represented reasonable value for the British taxpayer.Settling large tax disputes , National Audit Office
Nao.org.uk (14 June 2012). Retrieved on 2013-08-12. The

Arcadia Group Arcadia Group Ltd (formerly Arcadia Group plc and, until 1998, Burton Group plc) was a British multinational retailing company headquartered in London, England. It was best known for being the previous parent company of British Home Stores (B ...

's shops including Topshop, BHS, and Burton have been targeted as the group is owned by Tina Green, the wife of Sir Phillip Green. Tina Green is a resident of

Monaco Monaco, officially the Principality of Monaco, is a Sovereign state, sovereign city-state and European microstates, microstate on the French Riviera a few kilometres west of the Regions of Italy, Italian region of Liguria, in Western Europe, ...

and was able to receive a dividend of £1.2bn from the group free of UK

income tax An income tax is a tax imposed on individuals or entities (taxpayers) in respect of the income or profits earned by them (commonly called taxable income). Income tax generally is computed as the product of a tax rate times the taxable income. Tax ...

in 2005.

Boots A boot is a type of footwear. Most boots mainly cover the foot and the ankle, while some also cover some part of the lower calf. Some boots extend up the leg, sometimes as far as the knee or even the hip. Most boots have a heel that is clearl ...

was targeted on 30 January 2011 as the protesters claimed it avoided UK tax by being registered in Switzerland. Three people needed hospital treatment after police used CS spray when attempting to arrest a protester.

Fortnum & Mason Fortnum & Mason plc (colloquially often shortened to just Fortnum's) is an Luxury goods, upmarket department store in London, England. The main store is located at 181 Piccadilly in the St James's area of London, where it was established in 1707 ...

was targeted during 26 March 2011 anti-cuts protests. UK Uncut claimed that the parent company,

Wittington Investments Wittington Investments Limited is the name of two privately owned holding companies, one based in Britain, the other in Canada. Both companies are controlled by the Weston family. Through these holding companies, the Weston family control some o ...

was "guilty of tax avoidance". This took the form of a mass

sit-in A sit-in or sit-down is a form of direct action that involves one or more people occupying an area for a protest, often to promote political, social, or economic change. The protestors gather conspicuously in a space or building, refusing to mo ...

. The police arrested and charged 138 protesters with aggravated trespass. Of these, ten were convicted and were given a conditional discharge and fined £1,000. Their convictions were upheld at the Court of Appeal. In November 2011, the legal arm of UK Uncut took HM Revenue & Customs to court. HMRC had been accused of failing to provide substantial reasons for not collecting billions of pounds in tax revenue. HMRC are unable to comment on specific taxpayers' tax affairs. Instead, the National Audit Office (NAO) were asked to review the settlements in question, one being Vodafone, as mentioned above. The NAO found that "the settlements reached by HMRC in these five cases were all reasonable".

Banks

Through meetings on Twitter at the end of January it was decided that the next UK Uncut targets would be banks that were alleged to have caused the financial crisis and had been bailed out by the government with billions of pounds. UK Uncut called for people to stage "bail-ins" to turn banks into things that UK Uncut perceived as being threatened by the cuts.

HSBC HSBC Holdings plc ( zh, t_hk=滙豐; initialism from its founding member The Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation) is a British universal bank and financial services group headquartered in London, England, with historical and business li ...

have also been accused of avoiding £2 billion worth of tax by ''Private Eye'' magazine by using a complicated system of channeling profits through the Netherlands. On 19 February 2011,

Barclays Barclays PLC (, occasionally ) is a British multinational universal bank, headquartered in London, England. Barclays operates as two divisions, Barclays UK and Barclays International, supported by a service company, Barclays Execution Services ...

was targeted. The date was arranged to coincide with their bonus announcements. It was also alleged that Barclays was only paying 1% corporation tax in the UK. On 26 February, a day of action was called against the

Royal Bank of Scotland The Royal Bank of Scotland Public Limited Company () is a major retail banking, retail and commercial bank in Scotland. It is one of the retail banking subsidiaries of NatWest Group, together with NatWest and Ulster Bank. The Royal Bank of Sco ...

and their subsidiary

NatWest National Westminster Bank, trading as NatWest, is a major Retail banking, retail and commercial bank in the United Kingdom based in London, England. It was established in 1968 by the Corporate merger, merger of National Provincial Bank and We ...

. The protest was arranged to coincide with the banks' bonus announcements. Once again protestors turned bank branches into services that they considered were threatened by the cuts.

Healthcare

On 9 October 2011, 2,000 health workers and activists took part in a sit-down protest on

Westminster Bridge Westminster Bridge is a road-and-foot-traffic bridge crossing over the River Thames in London, linking Westminster on the west side and Lambeth on the east side. The bridge is painted predominantly green, the same colour as the leather seats ...

organised by UK Uncut in opposition to the proposed Health and Social Care Bill. The group has also targeted

Atos Atos SE is a European multinational information technology (IT) service and consulting company with headquarters in Bezons suburb of Paris, France, and offices worldwide. It specialises in hi-tech transactional services, unified communicat ...

, an IT company whose healthcare division operates a program for the

Department for Work and Pensions The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) is a Departments of the Government of the United Kingdom, ministerial department of the Government of the United Kingdom. It is responsible for welfare spending, welfare, pensions and child maintenance ...

to assess workers claiming

disability benefits Disability benefits are funds provided from public or private sources to a person who is ill or who has a disability. United Kingdom In the United Kingdom, disability benefits are covered by Department for Work and Pensions. There are numerous b ...

to see if they are "incapable" of work. Critics have felt that its program has lacked integrity and that its real goal is to divert funding from the disabled due to a lowered budget. The group also felt that it was inappropriate for Atos to sponsor the

2012 Summer Paralympics The 2012 Summer Paralympics, branded as the London 2012 Paralympic Games, were an international Multi-sport event, multi-sport parasports event held from 29 August to 9 September 2012 in London, England, United Kingdom. They were the 14th Sum ...

in London, a complementary event to the

Olympics The modern Olympic Games (Olympics; ) are the world's preeminent international sporting events. They feature summer and winter sports competitions in which thousands of athletes from around the world participate in a variety of competit ...

for the disabled given how its operation of the program has impacted the lives of many disabled workers through the denial of benefits. UK Uncut held a week of protests dubbed "The Atos Games" during the last week of August to coincide with the start of the Paralympics ending with a joint demonstration with Disabled People Against Cuts on 31 August outside the London headquarters of Atos and the Department for Work and Pensions. UK Uncut protesters, who were unimpressed by

Starbucks Starbucks Corporation is an American multinational List of coffeehouse chains, chain of coffeehouses and Starbucks Reserve, roastery reserves headquartered in Seattle, Washington. It was founded in 1971 by Jerry Baldwin, Zev Siegl, and Gor ...

' offer to pay £20 million corporation tax in the next two years, took part in protests in December 2012.

Spin-offs

A similar protest group inspired by UK Uncut has formed in the US under the name US Uncut. The protest also spread to other European countries, creating decentralized protest groups like Portugal Uncut. A group called Take VAT targeted several companies avoiding VAT by selling goods to the UK through the Channel Islands.

References

External links

UK Uncut
on

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