Apple a tax avoider? That’s total rubbish, rants boss

APPLE’S chief executive has branded criticism over its refusal to pay its taxes ‘political c**p’.

Tim Cook said it was not ‘reasonable’ for the tech giant to pay the full rate and blamed outdated tax codes. Mr Cook said he would not obey the law like most other businesses and individuals have to, until the system was overhauled.

Apple and other tech firms have been attacked for using complex accounting to move profits to low-tax areas such as Ireland.

Last year, after profits estimated at almost £2billion, Apple paid £11.8million in UK corporation tax, £400million less than was due. Chancellor George Osborne has introduced the ‘Google Tax’ to clamp down on such practices.

Apple has been criticised in the US too for failing to pay taxes on its profits despite its base in California. Mr Cook became agitated when asked on CBS about how he

‘We pay more than anyone’

felt at being labelled a tax avoider. He said: ‘That is total political c**p. There is no truth behind it. Apple pays every tax dollar we owe. We pay more taxes in this country than anyone’.

Mr Cook said he would ‘love to’ pay taxes on all foreign earnings in the US but it would be too costly: ‘It would cost me 40 per cent (in taxes) to bring it home. And I don’t think that’s a reasonable thing to do. This is a tax code that was made for the industrial age, not the digital age. It should have been fixed many years ago.’

Apple funnels profits through Ireland, enabling it to declare losses or tiny profits in the UK and pay minimal corporation tax.

Other tech giants run similarly creative schemes. The EU is investigating Google, Amazon and also Starbucks, after the coffee chain paid no corporation tax between 2009 and 2012, despite sales of £400million in one year alone.