A major CBC investigation just uncovered one of the biggest tax scandals in Canadian history. KPMG is helping millionaire clients avoid income taxes by using shady offshore bank accounts in tax havens.
Now, the Canada Revenue Agency is investigating KPMG's crimes -- but so far the multinational auditing giant is refusing to hand over the information. With this scandal breaking in the news, let's make sure that justice is served.
Tell KPMG: come clean about your shady tax scheme and hand over information to the Canada Revenue Agency now!
KPMG is one of the largest professional services companies in the world and one of the Big Four auditors, along with Deloitte, EY and PwC.
While most of us pay our fair share of taxes and suffer through budget cuts and austerity, KPMG is helping its wealthiest clients avoid taxes and -- even worse -- claim tax credits that are meant to help low and middle income Canadians.
Here's how the sham works: wealthy individuals "gift" their money to shell companies based in offshore tax havens. In return, these ultra-rich clients get non-taxable "gifts" back from the company. This way, clients are able to pay virtually no taxes while the rest of us hard-working people have to pay our fair share. Ridiculous right?
And it gets worse. KPMG is making a killing off this shady scheme. It gets to keep 15% of the taxes dodged by the clients -- money that would otherwise be used to fund healthcare, roads, public transit, education, support for refugees and more. Instead it's just lining KPMG's corporate coffers.
The Conservative government has wasted millions auditing charities, but Harper and his cronies are letting corporations like KPMG run professional tax dodging schemes. It's time KPMG played by the rules.
Tell KPMG: come clean about your dirty tax dodging scheme and hand over data to the CRA.
The SumOfUs community has stood up to tax dodgers in the past. Our HSBC campaign made front page news last spring when over 62,000 of us called on the UK government to investigate allegations of tax fraud, thousands of us sent formal complaints into the UK tax office and we commissioned legal advice to demonstrate the case against HSBC.
Taxes are crucial to our quality or life and our Canadian values -- they fund our schools, maintain our healthcare system, and allow us to provide a safe haven for refugees. Let's make sure corporations and the ultra rich pay their fair share like the rest of us.
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More information:
KPMG offshore 'sham' deceived tax authorities, CRA alleges, CBC News, September 9, 2015