Another take on Vodafone.
The idea that HMRC were strong armed by Vodafone, under some strange unspecified threat, to allow them to pay a lot less tax than they legally owed made zero sense to me. I used to work on tax planning projects for a global corporation of easily equivalent size to Vodafone and such a method of operation seemed the product of febrile minds keen to see the evil in big business rather than acknowledgement of the facts.
Of those criticising the settlement consider the legal issues that were being litigated. Most tax professionals were actually surprised Vodafone settled at all – on the basis of the ECJ judgment they had pretty good prospects for a clean win.
oops – obvious missing “never” in my first sentence.