Analysis

4 more Ratcliffes fleeing the Brexit ship

by Luke Lythgoe | 18.02.2019
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Brexiter Jim Ratcliffe, Britain’s richest man, could save £4 billion in tax by moving to Monaco, the Sunday Times reported. That means less money to fix the country’s real problems, such as the NHS – problems which led many people to vote to quit the EU in the first place.

Ratcliffe is not the first wealthy Brexit supporter to jump ship, move assets or advise others to disinvest from Brexit Britain. Here are four others.

James Dyson

The engineer behind the world’s most recognisable brand of hoovers, Dyson is a pin-up for Brexiters. But in January the company announced its head office was relocating from Wiltshire to Singapore. Its chief exec denied the move had anything to do with Brexit or tax, saying: “It’s to make us future-proof for where we see the biggest opportunities.” Could one of those opportunities be the fact that Singapore has just agreed a free trade agreement with the EU?

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Jacob Rees-Mogg

An investment firm co-founded by the hard Brexit Tory MP has set up two funds in Dublin. Somerset Capital Management denies the new funds have anything to do with Brexit. But in March 2018 it described the type of Brexit Rees-Mogg advocates as a risk to prospective investors. The MPs has a more than 15% stake in the firm and is paid for part-time work, according to the register of MPs’ financial interests.

John Redwood

In November 2017, the Tory MP recommended customers of an investment management firm he works for to “look further afield” than the UK because of the slowing economy – a direct result of the Leave vote Redwood and his Brexiter allies advocated a year earlier.

Nigel Lawson

Margaret Thatcher’s chancellor of the exchequer saw no problem chairing the Vote Leave campaign while still in France. And last May it was announced that he was applying for an official residency card. “I’m not concerned” about additional bureaucratic hoops people will have to jump through after Brexit, Lawson told English-speaking French newspaper the Connexion.

These leading Brexiters may have given up hope on the UK. But the rest of us shouldn’t. It’s not too late to keep our current deal inside the EU. It’s much better than any Brexit proposal, and leaves us with more money to spend on the problems which caused Brexit in the first place, as well as a bigger voice on the world stage to tackle the critical issues facing our planet.

The most democratic way to stop Brexit is to demand a People’s Vote. The best way to do that in the next few weeks is to attend the “Put It To The People” march on March 23.

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Edited by Hugo Dixon

15 Responses to “4 more Ratcliffes fleeing the Brexit ship”

  • One of the reasons supporters of James Dyson use for his relocation to Singapore is that it allows his firm to be nearer the huge markets of China, Korea and S.E. Asia. Funny how Britain’s being close to the rest of the huge single market that is the EU is never used as a valid reason to remain!

  • The likes of Ratcliffe are just immoral traitors to this country. The government needs to change the law to make it impossible to do this sort of thing. If money is earned in this country you should be liable for taxes wherever you hide it.

    No wonder people are disenchanted with politics.

  • Years ago before he was well known, Dyson’s company was peddling an investigation designed to prove his vacuum cleaners helped asthmatics. It was clearly dodgy marketing dressed up as science and my own hospital threw it out, but some institutions were fooled. He hasn’t changed much then, his products are all hype and no substance. Very much like Brexit, in fact.

  • Rees-Mogg has invested not a single penny in mainland UK. but has heavy investments in Russian banks. Given that no foreigner does business in Russia without the nod from the Kremlin, one wonders what he promised in return for his financial involvement. Or am I being paranoid ?

  • What is particularly galling is reading about hardline Brexiteers whose actions would help restrict the travel movements of millions of others around Europe, esp future generations, but have made sure their own situations are safeguarded. Lawson is an obvious example. It’s what used to be known as ‘I’m all right Jack’.
    Then again you have Farage on an unexplained visit to the German Embassy on “private business”. Just think, why would anyone normally visit a foreign embassy. Unless he’s fitting a new heating system, it can only be because he wants some kind of a permit or visa, no doubt before the complications caused by Brexit.

  • Remoaners are so desperate to prove Brexit is a mistake that any bits of news they like to blame on Brexit. The wish of real British people to leave the dictatorship, the massive waste of money which the EU has proven time & time again to have become. Roll on 29th March 2019 when Britain will be freed from the wasters of the EU.
    For those that wish to remain then I suggest that they look at all European Countries & decide which of them they wish to move to as they will not be happy in Britain.

  • ATCOR
    All Taxes Come Out of Rents.
    So take in tax the bare site rental value in Highest And Best Use,actual or potential, of all real property,and other gifts of nature like e.g radio spectrum, in your country.
    Tax dodging problem solved!
    EBCOR
    Excess Burden Comes Out of Rents
    Excess Burden is the economic distortions and losses inflicted on the economy when the tax system is badly designed.
    Excess Burden from real estate tax proposed above = zero.
    VAT in EU is one such poorly designed tax that inhibits production of goods and services (because it skews investment towards businesses with a low turnover of capital). Outside of the EU UK will have forfeited its ability to reform EU-wide taxes for the better. Taxes go to the heart of democratic government. To have successful prosperous European neighbours is a key national interestfor the UK and has been for centuries.
    SO STAY IN THE FLIPPING EU FOR GOODNESS’ SAKE.

  • Michael,
    It’s a mistake alright and a massive one at that. Not only will be leaving the world’s most successful trading block, but we will be looking round for any scraps of deals to try and mask our stupidity. And they don’t come any more stupid than a deal with the US with the demands from American lobbyists at the link below because they view us as being weak after Brexit.
    Project Fear?, welcome to Nightmare reality!
    https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/us-lobbyists-brexit_uk_5c5b26c6e4b00187b5579f64?guccounter=1

  • @ Michael
    You talk about the massive waste of money to the EU, but that will be a drop in the ocean set alongside the loss in income gernerated for the economy from departing key manufacturing and service industries. Nissan, Honda, Sony, Airbus and JaguarLR are just the warning signs.
    As for disgruntled leavers moving to EU countries, thanks to people such as yourself, they will be near the bottom end of the jobs recruitment process, and if we leave with a No Deal, having to pay for their healthcare and with frozen pensions.

  • Steady on chaps! Not all Ratcliffes are treacherous money grabbing little shits…. some of us campaign for remain and believe in a Britain that, rather than leave the EU should lead the EU.

  • Funny how brexiteers always want “non-patriotic” people to leave the country, as much as that only half of “the people” voted to leave the EU. “Real British people”, the “EU Dictatorship”; I wonder what was put in the beer in this country to make people sound like such mentally bloated pillow-huggers.

  • Michael Lyons, if anyone who is slightly more savvy about economic issues than you and your ilk leaves the country, do you realize that what you are going to be left with is a bunch of financial wide boys in gated and guarded communities whilst the 17.2 million brexiteers may be very glad if they can be employed as peasants. Not that that would worry you, obviously, seeing that according to Gove the country has had enough of experts anyway.

  • Alex – Farage’s children are entitled to German nationality by virtue of his ex-marriage to a German wife. Given this and the fact that most, if not all, of his extra marital affairs have been with European women, one wonders why he is so anti-EU.

  • Lawson is no longer resident in France. The French authorities have no record of any application by him for a Carte de Sejour (registration card), nor are they ever likely to get one, since in order to be registered as resident, you must be paying tax in France (on your world-wide income). He pays tax in the UK since otherwise he would not be able to sit in the Lords. He was a bag of wind when in government and that hasn’t changed.