Taxation: UK's "super" tax on bank bonuses backed by France

The French government has been cowardly: having said it wanted to tax bankers' bonuses, it also said it would not be the first to do so.

This week, the UK announced such a tax - at the extraordinarily high rate of 50% of bonuses that exceed GBP25,000. The French immediately said they would also impose a tax - but as yet have not said how much. Nor have they said for how long: the UK has limited it to bonuses paid in the current tax year.

Our colleagues over at www.bankinginsurancesecurities.com have today reported that this is a strategy to allow Gordon Brown's Labour party to pressure David Cameron's Conservative Party to declare where they stand over the taxation of bonuses in future years - years in which Brown has already committed substantial proportion of GDP to the banking bailout, into which he continues to pour money by the thousands of millions. Brown must call an election within the next six months and he is, BankingInsuranceSecurites.Com says, lining up his ducks in readiness.

BankingInsuranceSecurities.Com reports that there are a number of options for bankers who say "enough is enough," suffering as they do under one of the world's highest tax regimes whilst working in one of the world's most advanced industries from the point of view of both communications and technology. Hong Kong, Singapore, Dubai, Bahrain and Florida are options they describe.

Germany has said that it likes the idea of taxing bonuses but is not ready to implement such a scheme.