In 2010 Deputy Carolyn Labey successfully took a proposition to the States calling on the Treasury Minister to come up with ways to tax such businesses.
She said that she wanted to create a level playing field on which local and non-local firms could compete and to get foreign firms to pay for trading in Jersey.
Under the current zero-ten regime, non-finance companies pay no corporate tax, but the owners of those companies who live in Jersey pay 20 per cent tax on the income they receive. That means such companies which are owned by non-resident shareholders contribute nothing directly to the Treasury.
Revenue loss
On Tuesday Treasury Minister Philip Ozouf released a report drafted by his department in response to the Deputy’s proposition. It put forward a series of options for new taxes, rates and charges which would enable foreign companies to be taxed, but which would also be levied from locally owned firms. It is not permissible under European rules to discriminate between non-locally-owned companies and those owned by Island residents.
