UK Prime Minister David Cameron had a stake in an offshore fund set up by his late father, Ian, until six years ago, he said, answering for the first time the question of whether he ever benefited from the investment.
The premier has been under intense pressure to give details of his interests in the Blairmore Holdings Inc. fund since it was mentioned in reports that emerged Sunday following the leak of millions of documents from a Panamanian law firm detailing attempts to avoid tax. He previously only said that he, his wife Samantha and their children hold no offshore funds now and will not in the future.
“Samantha and I had a joint account,” Cameron said Thursday in an interview with ITV News. “We owned 5,000 units in Blairmore Investment Trust, which we sold in January 2010,” a few months before he became prime minister. The stake “was worth something like 30,000 pounds” ($57,000), he said. The couple made a profit, but it wasn’t enough to be subject to capital-gains tax, Cameron said, adding that income tax was paid on the dividends.
The furore over the fund has hit Cameron at a time when he’s fighting multiple crises, with his Conservative Party divided over whether or not Britain should stay in the European Union and doubts about the survival of the UK steel industry. After a bruising week in which UK media have picked over the Cameron family’s ties to the fund, the prime minister is trying to put the controversy to rest.
For the opposition Labour Party, it wasn’t enough, with deputy leader Tom Watson describing it as an “extraordinary admission from the prime minister.”
“Far from being the end of the matter, the questions keep coming,” Watson said in a statement. “Given that he claimed that ‘sunlight is the best disinfectant,’ why has it taken six years for this to come to light?”
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The premier has been under intense pressure to give details of his interests in the Blairmore Holdings Inc. fund since it was mentioned in reports that emerged Sunday following the leak of millions of documents from a Panamanian law firm detailing attempts to avoid tax. He previously only said that he, his wife Samantha and their children hold no offshore funds now and will not in the future.
“Samantha and I had a joint account,” Cameron said Thursday in an interview with ITV News. “We owned 5,000 units in Blairmore Investment Trust, which we sold in January 2010,” a few months before he became prime minister. The stake “was worth something like 30,000 pounds” ($57,000), he said. The couple made a profit, but it wasn’t enough to be subject to capital-gains tax, Cameron said, adding that income tax was paid on the dividends.
The furore over the fund has hit Cameron at a time when he’s fighting multiple crises, with his Conservative Party divided over whether or not Britain should stay in the European Union and doubts about the survival of the UK steel industry. After a bruising week in which UK media have picked over the Cameron family’s ties to the fund, the prime minister is trying to put the controversy to rest.
For the opposition Labour Party, it wasn’t enough, with deputy leader Tom Watson describing it as an “extraordinary admission from the prime minister.”
“Far from being the end of the matter, the questions keep coming,” Watson said in a statement. “Given that he claimed that ‘sunlight is the best disinfectant,’ why has it taken six years for this to come to light?”
Click Here To Register For Free Trial Services OR Give A Missed Call : +6531581402 Follow Us On Twitter : www.twitter.com/epicresearchsg Like Us On Facebook : www.facebook.com/EpicResearchSingapore Need Any Assistance Feel Free To Mail Us at : info@epicresearch.sg
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