Trouble in Paradise

The latest revelations about how the richest protect their wealth and minimise their tax burden tell us little but confirm a great deal. The information in the Paradise Papers show us a truly glittering pageant of celebrities using offshore tax havens, including fine upstanding members of the community, such as Queen Elizabeth II herself, Trump’s Commerce Secretary with shady friends in Russia, Wilbur Ross and, regrettably, the mostly admirable Prime Minister of Canada, Justin Trudeau.

Why, it seems that even Bono, fine humanitarian and protector of the poor in the Third World, may have been benefitting from tax regulations that protect the rich of the Old World. Ironically, I read (in a piece from the Sunday Express, not the most reliable of sources, but this story has the ring of truth), that Bono’s own foundation was set to denounce the tax haven system until it realised that he was a beneficiary.

Still, it isn’t these fine luminaries that interest me here, but just two specific individuals, for what they reveal of how our system works more generally.

(Lord) Michael Ashcroft
Worthy citizen, tax avoider and major contributor to the Tory Party

The first of these is Michael Ashcroft, Lord Ashcroft, former Deputy Chairman of the British Conservative Party and one of its main individual contributors. For many years, he held “non-domiciled” status in the UK, meaning he could live in the country without paying its taxes. When he was raised to the House of Lords, he pledged to give up that status and become a full UK resident, but failed to do so for ten years, when a change in the law would have forced him to give up his peerage otherwise.

It now turns out that he’s a major tax haven investor. That saves a power of tax. Who needs non-dom status when you have tax havens you can take advantage of – and without even giving up your peerage? You might feel, and I’d tend to agree, that the law needs changing again, so that a member of the House of Lords can’t benefit from tax havens any more than from being non-domiciled in the UK.But let s see why that s not likely to happen.

The use of a tax haven saves someone like Ashcroft a great deal of tax. That sets up a fine cycle of mutual benefit. With so much more money to play with, it’s easy for him to make contributions to his favoured political cause, in this case the Conservative Party. For the 2017 election campaign, he stumped up £500,000, which by British standards is a massive contribution to a political party.

Now, isn’t that neat? Serious money for a political party. The party that happens to be in government. In government at least in part thanks to that money.

Now, how much priority would you expect that government to set on changing the law to deal with the abuse of tax havens?

The second person is something of a favourite of mine.

Glencore is one of the world’s major commodities companies. The Paradise Papers reveal that Glencore “loaned” £45m to a shady Israeli businessman, on the basis that it would be repaid if they failed to win a lucrative deal in the blood-soaked, deeply corrupt so-called Democratic Republic of the Congo. Nothing illegal seems to have happened, but that only highlights the weakness of the law. It may have been legal, but there was nothing edifying about this transaction.

So how about this favourite character of mine? He wasn’t with Glencore at the time, but he is now. He’s the company’s non-executive chairman.

His name is Anthony (Tony) Hayward. Not a name to conjure with, you may feel, and I’d agree though I have mentioned him before. If you’ve heard of him at all, it’s likely to have been in the context of the Deepwater Horizon disaster in the Gulf of Mexico, when an oil exploration platform caught fire and the ensuing oil spill polluted vast swaths of the Gulf.

Deepwater Horizon: fitting monument to reign of Tony Hayward

The oil rig belonged to BP. And the Chief Executive of the time? Why, Tony Hayward.

He came to fame with a series of brilliant gaffes. The one I like the best was his apology for the damage and, indeed, loss of life caused:

We're sorry for the massive disruption it's caused their lives. There's no one who wants this over more than I do. I would like my life back.

I’m sure he wanted all that unpleasantness over. As I’m sure that the millions whose lives or livelihoods were affected by the oil spill, to different degrees but seldom positively, couldn’t have given a flying curse for how much he wanted his life back.

Now just as the tax haven issue proves how little consideration of integrity or any kind of principle drives our governments, the Tony Hayward story reveals how little high business office owes to competence or even basic humanity. The colossal remuneration these people receive is often justified as being a reflection of the responsibility they accept. But far from being driven into the outer darkness where there is wailing and gnashing of teeth, Hayward simply stepped from BP into a series of lucrative and comfortable directorships, including at Glencore.

He wasn’t with Glencore at the time of the Congo deal. But still, it’s interesting that it was a company with as savoury a reputation as Glencore that offered him its non-executive chairmanship. And that a man with his track record accepted it.

Might that be just a coincidence? Speaking for myself, I doubt it.

They deserve every penny they receive: the case of Glencore and Tony Hayward

Spare a thought for that poor fellow, Tony Hayward.

I use the word “poor” in the moral sense, of course, rather than the financial. He’s reported to have made about £2.3 million in 2013, and rather more last year, so I don’t think he’s likely to fall victim any time soon to, say, any cuts in benefits support the UK government will be pushing through in the next few months.

However, £2.3 million is terrible cut from his maximum remuneration, o £3.2 million back in 2009, his last full year as Chief Executive of BP.

Ah, yes, it’s all falling into place now, isn’t it? You remember. Hayward was the man who revealed his diplomatic skills when, a few weeks after the Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, he announced to the press that “I would like my life back.” Since he was at the head of the company ultimately responsible for the drilling rig which caused the disaster, that was a sentiment that was received with less enthusiasm than he might have been hoping for.

It was like the acclaim that greeted Jeb Bush recently when he commented on the latest school shooting in the US, that left nine dead, that “stuff happens.”

The awkwardness at Deepwater Horizon
It caused some discomfort to that unfortunate Mr Hayward

Hayward quite soon got his life back, when BP decided that it might be better all round, taking everything into account and weighing one thing against another, if their ways parted.

He then faced all the problems that those of us who lose our jobs know and dread. He was forced eventually to settle for a much less well-paid job. You can no doubt imagine the feeling of despair: going from £3.2 million to £2.3 million represents a drastic pay cut, not far off 30%. It must have felt like virtual pauperisation.

In fact, things were so bad that poor Mr Hayward, like so many inhabitants of US trailer parks, say, was forced to take not just one job, but two. As well as the interim chairmanship of Glencore, he also took charge of energy company Genel. He had a number of other charitable appointments around the City of London to make sure he could keep the wolf from the door, but you can no doubt picture the stress he had to undergo, with all those jobs.

Fortunately, Genel was able to increase its remuneration package to him last year, by 41.5%, taking him to £2.5 million. And since he’s moved from interim chair of Glencore to take the post definitively, his salary went up to £685,000. With other payments – bonuses, etc. – there’s every chance that he’ll have moved beyond where he was with BP.

All this goes to prove that you can’t keep a good man down. You deliver the goods, and you’ll be paid a reasonable, proportionate return.

For instance, the generous increase in Hayward’s salary from Genel came in a year in which he presided over the company making a loss of £213 million.

Meanwhile, and this is why I’m talking about this at all, Glencore is back in the news these days. It’s the world’s tenth largest company, but what’s most important about it is that it’s massively dependent on the trade in metals – it controls 60% of the world's trade in zinc, apparently, and 50% of the world’s trade in copper. So it’s a barometer of the problems building up for the world right now. The economies, notably China’s, on which we’ve all been relying on for growth in recent years, are slowing; they want less metal; the prices fall; Glencore’s taking a hit. 

On a single day at the end of September, Glencore shares collapsed so badly that Chief Executive Ivan Glasenberg lost $500 million of his personal fortune. That left him in relative penury, with just $1.4 billion, down from $7.3 billion in July 2014. It seems Glencore has recovered most of its most recent share price fall, but taking a longer view, shares that were trading at £5 in 2011 are now down to £1.

At least Hayward managed a small increase in salary last year despite these problems.

Aditya Chakrabortty has given us a fine piece in The Guardian, predicting the difficulties George Osborne will face in 2017, as UK Chancellor of the Exchequer, in accounting for the economic crash that’s coming. Where copper goes, he points out, the world follows, and copper’s on the way down. So Glencore’s troubles are a warning of global troubles to come.

Isn’t it sad that Mr Hayward seems again to have got himself involved in a company that’s facing a degree of unpleasantness? Why, he may be called on to dazzle us once more with his fabled communication skills, perhaps a little honed since Deepwater Horizon. This time, the disaster he fails to avert will be far more far-reaching, affecting the globe and not just the Gulf of Mexico.

In any case, we must surely be left with a sense of the general rightness of things, in a world where top executives of the companies that determine our destinies, deserve and receive the remuneration their skills command.