GUERNSEY’S early declaration that it would work around a presumed corporation tax rate of 10% worried the other Crown Dependencies, a tax expert from the Isle of Man has revealed.

Greg Jones, tax director at KPMG in the Isle of Man, was speaking yesterday at the local office’s annual breakfast seminar to discuss the detail of the UK Budget.

Mr Jones (pictured) said the States’ announcement back in October that Guernsey would press ahead on a presumption of introducing a general corporate tax rate of 10%, in the immediate aftermath of the discovery that the island’s zero-10 regime was falling foul of the EU code of conduct, caught the Isle of Man and Jersey completely off guard.

‘Guernsey took our breath away when they made statements about 10% tax, but thankfully that has slightly come back now,’ said Mr Jones, a regular commentator in offshore tax matters around the world.

He said the issue for the Isle of Man and Jersey was because the EU and the UK viewed each of them similarly to Guernsey. The island’s announcement might then have immediately tied them to the same approach.

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