An ex-HMRC tax adviser has been jailed for 18 months over a £70m tax fraud exploiting the rules for charitable giving.

David Perrin, Deputy Managing Director at Vantis Tax Ltd created a tax avoidance scheme to maximise tax relief on donations of shares and received more than £2m in fees.

Perrin set up companies on the Channel Islands Stock Exchange and paid people to sell the shares to inflate their price. Share owners then donated 329 million shares to various unsuspecting registered charities and tried to claim £70m tax relief on a total of £213m of income and company profits. The shares were actually worthless.

According to HMRC the scheme proved so popular that Vantis employees performed a smug celebratory song at their annual conference, to the tune of “I will survive”. It included the verse: “They should have changed that stupid law, they should have buggered charity, but they have left that lovely tax relief, for folks to pay to me.”

Jim Graham, HMRC Criminal Investigator, said:
“With his knowledge of the tax system, Perrin thought that he was one step ahead of both HMRC and the law. This cynical fraud not only stole millions of pounds from taxpayers, but also conned innocent charities into accepting gifts of virtually worthless shares, just so Perrin could inflate his own criminal earnings.”