FLIGHT FROM TAXATION BRITISH TALENT DRAIN MAY HASTEN COUNTRY’S DECLINE

Press, Volume CXVI, Issue 34130, 17 April 1976, Page 14

FLIGHT FROM TAXATION BRITISH TALENT DRAIN MAY HASTEN COUNTRY’S DECLINE

'By

RUSSELL LEWIS,

in the “Daily Telegraph ’)

'Reprinted bi/ arrangement)

As Imperial Spain slid into decadence, her exports, it was said, consisted largely of soldiers, priests, and colonists. Declining Britain, empire already gone, seems to be entering an even more advanced stage of decrepitude in which her exports are mainly spoilsmen, pop stars and tycoons as well as some more likeable folk, both talented and humble.

The decision that Joe Bugner recently made to join the brain, and in his case also the brawn, drain has highlighted what might, come to be seen by historians |as a milestone on this country’s long march to i penury and decadence. It might be said to mark the beginning of the last phase when anyone with internationally saleable talents fled our shores.

Bugner’s case is a poignant one. He came here as an exile from Hungary and clearly had every wish to stay. Unfortunately the fight with the Inland Revenue was one he just could not win. For our taxes are not merely high, they fail to take account of the boxer’s life style — up one minute, down the next. So. if a boxer is lucky[ enough to stop fighting for! peanuts and instead steps! into the ring with Ali (did I say lucky?) whether or not' he ends up spread on the canvas, and bruised from ear to ear, the taxman will not! spread his earnings from year to year. So Bugner: found himself paying 831 pence in the pound for his share of the purse. He is not the only one, es-j [pecially in the last 12 months, which have beenj !unusual for the number of, [sports celebrities who have 1 decided to bid Britain farewell. For instance there is the top golfer Tony Jacklin. He also blamed taxation which, he said, made it impossible for him to provide for his family's future.

So he is off to Jersey where he will put his marginal tax rate down from 98 to 20 per cent. The great fear of people in his position is that their period of peak earning capacity, whether due to ill-luck, accident, or illness, may prove all too short, and then all they have left will be their photograph albums.

It is the same story with Mark Cox, Britain’s leading tennis star, and James Hunt, the British Grand Prix racing driver, who has gone to Spain — but only, it seems, because he is not rich enough to live in Jersey, where the authorities only let in as residents those with S4m in capital and an income approaching $200,000 a year. Singers and actors As for the pop drain, the I big names include the Bay 'City Rollers, Keith Moon, [Rod Stewart, Mick Jagger, 'and Tom Jones. Or take film [actors: apart from Michael Caine, who got fed up living [abroad, it is harder to think I of those who have stayed I than those who have long since departed — like Dirk Bogarde, Rex Harrison, Sean Connery, and Richard Burton, to name only a few of the superstar exiles. Going up market, as they say, there is John Ogdon, one of Britain’s leading pianists, who normally earns about $lOO,OOO a year, and has lately decided to take

off to Marbella His com-I plaint is that, since the law 1 set a limit to mortgage tax relief at $50,000 he has found the mortgage repayments on his house in Regent’s Park absolutely; crippling. His wife added that the combination of; taxes and the general feeling of gloom was driving them away.

; Many writers have fled, too, especially best selling novelists, like Frederick Forsyth to Spam. Anthony Burgess to Italy, and Alistair Maclean to Switzerland. Ominous, too, is the flight of leading economists, especially those who specialise in the study of money. In the last year Professors Laidler and Parkin have gone from Manchester to Ontario. Professor Alan Walters of the London School of Economics is the most recent to decide to cross the Atlantic.

He told me that he just could not face another incomes policy cycle, with the ‘initial false hopes and delusions of light at the end of the tunnel, and then renewed frustration and cynicism when the whole policy blows up in another wages explosion — in the present case around the beginning of 1978. .More doctors go We have all heard of the flight of the medical professions, pursued by the frantic screams of Barbara Castle. According to the 8.M.A., in the first six nonths of last year the number of doctors enquiring about jobs abroad was 622, a big rise on the 546 inquiries in the whole of 1974 and a very big one on the mere 71 inquiries in 1973. Another indicator, says the B.M.A. is the surge in the number of British doctors trying examinations to equip themselves with American qualifications.

Yet the statistics are! apparently just the tip of' the iceberg. According to Mr! David Sutton, director of the! Pathology Department of St I Mary’s Hospital, London, the: loss from his department of I two senior registrars and two registrars last year for , appointments overseas was 1 unknown to the authorities : and did not appear in any i official statistics. On making (inquiries at the 12 other ;London teaching hospitals, he found that a similar situation applied in them. Among businessmen mak-i ing their escape, the most’ notable of last year s exiles I was Alan Bristow, founder: of a Surrey-based helicopter; firm, who said that taxes! had cost him $300,000 in the: last year alone. Another! boardroom boss to quit was! T. F. G. Atherton, the chairman of Dorman Smith Holdiings, who said that tax was whittling his gross income of $80,240 to a net $13,670 a year. The present leakage could become a flood. Lastyear a survey carried out by I Kiernan and Company Consuitants showed that 79 per] cent of British managers'

were considering the possi bilitv of working overseas

Among miscellaneous emigrants there is Mrs Thelma Gray. the Surrey dog breeder, who has supplied i corg.is to the Royal Family, and sundry canines to the , Shah of Persia and the King and Queen of Thailand. Site announced last October that she was off to Australia because of the high price of dog biscuits. Then there is Mr Teddy Tinling, the tennis dress designer the man behind the notorious lace-edged : panties with which Gussie I Moran sent a shockwave through Wimbledon. He has left for the United States ■ where he sees a more laceedged future. Humbler let cl At a humbler level, but perhaps a more significant (one. the deep sea divers who 'work on the oil rigs, the best of whom earn $BOO a week, are seeking out havens where they will not be torpedoed by the taxman, and some of them have opened Swiss bank accounts. Up again to street level, there is a 26-year-old policeman, Stephen Parker, who, until recently, was pounding (the beat in Chelmsford, Essex, but decided last autumn to quit in order to do the same job in Toronto, where there is double the pay, and he thinks he will be sole to afford to buy hi. own home.

Are all these examples indicative of a trend, or are they just bits of selective evidence for knocking Britain? Unhappily the talent drain is real and growing. Apparently 225.000 people, most of them skilled, emigrated in 1974, and present indications are that twice as many went in 1975. If so, emigration is now about level with the all-time high achieved just before the First World War. Then, however, the bulk of those leaving consisted of comparatively penniless young men going out to the Empire or America to seek their fortune. Now' it consists of people who have either made their pile already, or are confident that they have a period of very high earnings immediately ahead.

There is nothing mysterious about the motive for exile. In the overwhelming majority of cases people go because they will be substantially better off — if they are earning, in terms of gross pay, and. earning or not, in terms of less going to the ta> man. Moreover, if Britons are leaving in such numbers, when there is a world recession, imagine w’hat an exodus there will be when, as is very much on the cards, the world recovers while Britain still stagnates.

Of course it is an ill-wind . . . at the Berlitz school of languages, which handles a lot of people going to jobs abroad, they tell me tha' they are on the up and up

Across I—Aim to get unusual praise. (6) 4— Being pertinacious, kept close on the scent. (6) 9—Feelings of discomfort caused bv rifle practice? (8, 5) 10— Tries to reform the Post Office inside to get a quick answer. (7) 11— Get to the top of graduated measure. (5) 12— Susie is upset by children. (5) 14—Soft, ill-mannered one showing priggish modesty. (5) 18— An account given by the sappers will show the extent of the field. (5) 19— Noted visitor to the underworld. (7) 21— Could it be where the rank and file come from? (7, 6) 22— In groups we will produce confectionery. (6) 23 — Not set back by modern propounder of scientific theory. (6) Down 1— Declare rates must be modified about the start of September. (6) 2— What one at the side of the stage gives to actors'? (6, 7) 3— By the sound of it, makes a record of ecclesiastical observances. (5) 5— He’s not in favour of a problem after work (7) 6— Bandit rearing in an ugly way — show some fortitude. (4, 3. 4. 2) 7— Confounded girl interrupting father. (6) 8 and 16 Down—The sort of agent subjected to insurance. (5-5) 13— Out-of bed with a jump — he’s only just made Pitc h t * le tent on American university ground <6 16—See 8 Down. '' Behind some of the master navigators. (6) 20— Naturally tending to be tace downwards. <5) (Solution on Monday) Ihursday's solution M a dr A a C n°Ti : % En ? bra^; s - Amazed 9. Plenary 10, Cleric ’ P 2l Shmr’/ 77 S,r,kin * ,8 - Adroitlv. 20. Cleric, 21, Stupor, 22, Contain; 23, Across; 24, HearMahS n 6 Rpnt al m - t; ,- 2 ’ Par *dora; 3, Remark. 5, son- 15 Cvore^ nt ?R ai Clrc,e; Inaction; 14 Stepson, 10. Cypress, 16, Alcove; 17, Waiter; 19, Optics.