Them and us fishes, photo Suzanne Beishon

Them and us fishes, photo Suzanne Beishon   (Click to enlarge: opens in new window)

Chocs away

Multinational food giant Mondelez dodged nearly £36 million in UK tax last year.

The US-based corporation made pre-tax profits of £117.3 million. But interest payments and a tax-exempt sale meant it paid zero corporation tax.

Mondelez – then part of Kraft Foods – bought UK chocolate firm Cadbury in 2010. Boss Irene Rosenfeld had promised not to close the Somerdale factory near Bristol.

>She did close it. 400 workers lost their jobs.

Cadbury UK also paid no corporation tax on profits of £96.5 million. Rosenfeld ‘earned’ £13.1 million.

You can’t control what you don’t own. The Socialist says: nationalise the food giants to stop tax dodging and safeguard jobs and quality.


Water rip-off!

The richest man in Hong Kong, billionaire Li Ka-shing, has made £140 million from his stakes in UK water companies.

Southern Water started paying dividends again for the first time in five years, including £82 million for Li. This was in spite of receiving an average of twice the complaints of other water firms.

And Northumbrian Water paid CKI, Li’s holding company, £58 million. Tax breaks meant it paid no corporation tax on its £131 million profits.

Water regulator Ofwat announced a restriction on water bill hikes in 2014. However, this was not enough to outpace inflation. The average annual water bill was set to break the £400 barrier in 2015.

Before the Tories privatised utilities in 1989, the average bill was £236. Public ownership under democratic worker’s control and management could sort that out.