Occupy and UK Uncut

International Tax Review is part of Legal Benchmarking Limited, 1-2 Paris Garden, London, SE1 8ND

Copyright © Legal Benchmarking Limited and its affiliated companies 2025

Accessibility | Terms of Use | Privacy Policy | Modern Slavery Statement

Occupy and UK Uncut

Social movements

t10p-occupy-n-uncut300.jpg

Occupy London Stock Exchange and UK Uncut represent how corporate tax moved from a solely-boardroom issue to a public concern.

For months, it was impossible to leave ITR Towers without wading through a sea of tents filled with hippies, socialists, anarchists in Guy Fawkes masks, punks, students and, yes, ordinary concerned citizens camped outside St Paul’s Cathedral.

The new ad hoc, bottom-up social movements, exemplified by Occupy and Uncut, that have sprung up around the world to try to take over stores and Wall Street alike have tax at the heart of their agenda.

Far from the unfocused layabouts their enemies might like to see them as, their core objective has always been holding banks and big companies to account for their role in the financial downturn and their encouragement of government austerity measures to fix it.

Crucial to this is ensuring these organisations pay their fair share of tax.

The original campers in Zuccotti Park in New York and outside St Paul’s have long since been sent on their way, but the issues they brought to public attention cannot be swept aside so easily. Detailed information about the tax corporations do or do not pay, is being splashed across daily newspapers and websites like never before. These stories are moving corporate tax matters from the business sections to the front pages.

View the complete Global Tax 50 list

Return to the top 10

more across site & shared bottom lb ros

More from across our site

Braun gives ITR an exclusive insight into WTS Digital’s UK launch of its AI product, which can free up more than 1,500 hours per month by reducing routine tasks
Long tells ITR about her varied role, why curiosity is a key characteristic for the tax professional, and what she’d be doing if she wasn’t working in tax
The choice facing governments is not whether to adopt AI in taxation, but how to do so in a way that upholds the principles of tax fairness, writes Neil Kelley
As ITR’s client data reveals discontent with German tax advisers’ cost management, Grant Thornton’s local TP head insists it’s a two-way street
Uncertainty isn’t always a bad thing, but it’s easy to see how the Trump administration’s IRS commissioner merry-go-round may serve to undermine business confidence
The EU defended its ‘sovereign right’ to impose the tax in the face of US tariff threats; in other news, the US deputy Treasury secretary resigned after just five months
Ascoria’s chief revenue officer shares her career wisdom garnered from the disparate worlds of tax technology, electric cables, radio DJing and more
Businesses no longer have a choice when it comes to tax technology transformation. Pavlo Boyko of TMF Group says the question is simply: sink or swim?
The firm is hunting for a senior TP manager in its quest to build a full-service practice in Indonesia, A&M Tax’s Jakarta head Jaap Zwaan tells ITR
With a new government in place, the evolving tax landscape presents both opportunities and challenges for taxpayers
Gift this article