Thursday, 15 May 2014 1

Corporate Solutions Newsletter

PUTTING IT ON AT THE RITZ Our recent luncheon at The Ritz was a huge success! GB

Music Events launched their unique and innovative team

building workshops that have been utilised by many

prestigious companies including Jewson and the NHS!

Ian Hooper (left) gave a very informative presentation about

the non-competitive music workshops that create team bonds

and empower staff.

The stunning William Kent Room (left, background) wowed

everyone with its breath taking design and formed the perfect

background for an exciting new product, which certainly had everyone talking whilst we indulged in Executive Chef

John Williams’ delicious menu.

The William Kent Room is an awe-inspiring dining room decorated in Italian Renaissance style that is often described as

the most beautiful hotel dining room in the world. The meal was exquisite and without giving anything away I have to

say that the spectacular dessert was certainly something to behold.

If you would like any information on the Team Building Workshops that GB Music Events offer then please get in touch

with Emma Millard on events@corporate-solutions.org.uk or call on 01908 547925.

MORRY’S SHEEKEY BIRTHDAY

Although names are withheld to preserve anonymity and protect the

innocent, we have it on good authority that our Honorable Chairman’s

86th Birthday was celebrated in style by friends old and new at the

venerable fish restaurant J Sheekeys in Covent Garden. With a

smattering of new celebs, old film directors, fellow sporting and

drinking fans Morry was on top form dispensing anatomically

impossible advice to all those that he thought might benefit.

Here’s wishing a belated Happy Birthday to Morry we hope you have

another good year in your bid to pass Methuselah! In a grey world,

characters like Morry provide the light and colour! Even if sometimes

we mere mortals need sunglasses to protect our eyes!

Issue 1 Thursday 15th May 2014

This is our inaugural edition of the Corporate Solutions Newsletter that will be released every four months. Reporting on

previous events, upcoming events, services, achievements and you can find our ‘Sports Page’ on the back! If you have

any queries on any articles in this edition you can contact Emma on events@corporate-solutions.org.uk.

Inside this issue

Musings from the Bar

An Enchanted Evening at our annual

Summer Ball

Silver Linings

A weekend of drama and Murder

Staff achievements

Luxury private shopping event

SPORTS – on the back page

Thursday, 15 May 2014 2

MUSINGS FROM THE BAR (The last free bastion for open Tax discussion) By Ipso Dipso

Avoid the anti-avoidance if you can! With Icebreaker 2 about to do a ‘Titanic’ we can all look forward to another

round of media frenzy regarding Celebrity Tax affairs, with the same old re-hashing of partially moral arguments that

surfaced following Jimmy Carr’s “outing” from K2.

So is Tax a “moral” issue? I think if we accept the modern society definition that morals are defined by the

“acceptable” behaviour of the majority we could ask the government to find out definitively; how? By making Tax

optional and seeing who pays! Not many, I would wager - or more importantly - not enough. In life we all have to do

things we don’t want to but know are essential and paying Tax is in that category. However the problem starts when we

consider how much is “enough”. Con-men have for years confused people with percentages versus real figures and in

some ways that is the tax argument. If a wealthy individual is found to have paid less than 10% of his income in UK

taxes then there is a mass round of righteous indignation that completely ignores the fact that the same individual may

have paid hundreds of thousands of pounds in taxes, and not even including the 20% VAT spent on anything he pays

for in the UK. This sum may be enough to fund an entire street of benefit claimants but will not appear in the media.

Selling newspapers and increasing viewing figures may be behind this bias, or simple jealousy, but it is quite dangerous

- or have we not learned our lessons from the 70’s when income tax reached an effective 98% and everyone avoided

everything!

Today we have GAAR and TAAR (General Anti Avoidance and Targeted Anti Avoidance) which basically means that

if HMRC thinks something looks fishy and smells fishy, it is a fish, despite legal proof that it is a donkey! However

with many legal precedents like ‘Mercury Tax Group v IRC’ there is still hope that common sense will prevail, and if

you take proper advice you are guaranteed to pay no more than you should - which I think is “morally” the correct

thing to do.

My round I think.

ONE ENCHANTED EVENING Our annual Summer Ball has always been the talk of the town and this year we plan to dazzle and bewitch with our

Enchanted Forest theme on Friday 18th July 2014.

Starring the best tenor of our time, the wonderful Alfie Boe! Guaranteed to leave hairs standing on end as he

delights and entertains guests in the stunning surroundings of the Landmark Hotel, London.

After the superlative four course dinner the usual live auction will commence, which alongside the more discreet

silent auction will be raising funds for ‘The Wasps Legends’ and ‘Wooden Spoon’, two fabulous charities who do

amazing work with Children.

To find out more information on tables, tickets and sponsorship packages that are available please contact Emma at

events@corporate-solutions.org.uk or call 01908 547925.

Starring Alfie Boe!

Thursday, 15 May 2014 3

SILVER LININGS By Jonathan Silver - Inside Counsel

Among the very dry and dusty judgments that our Clients’ seek to rely on it’s always nice to find examples of learned

thinking that reassure us that our lives are safe in their hands.

Recently our knowledge pool has been increased by the Judge in ‘Innocent v HMRC’ in the Upper Tax Tribunal. He has

ruled along the same lines as a previous judgment that helped us through that age old question of ‘when is a cake not a

cake?’ (Jaffa Cakes appeal against a VAT ruling) - when it was enshrined that a “cake” is soft when fresh and hard when

stale, with the reverse true of a “biscuit” (obviously not tried my baking!! And don’t get me started on “Cookies”!). His

ruling was in respect of Innocent Smoothies who argued that they should be zero rated as they were simply a “fruit

salad” that has gone through a liquidizer. Leaving aside the obvious doubts this raises as to their price, he found (among

other things) that legally, as agreed facts:

1. Smoothies are delicious

2. Smoothies are hard to drink through narrow straws

Well I think we can all be grateful that that’s sorted out then!

(For those interested - No they were not “innocent” - guilty as charged; NO ZERO Rating for Smoothies).

STAFF ACHIEVEMENTS

Following the appointment of Andy

Wojcik, our In Tandem Resources

Director, and Matt Longley, our Director

of Group Sales, we would also like to

congratulate the following people;

Angela Edwards who has been promoted

to Supervisor of our internal sales team!

We would also like to welcome to our

team Leah Williamson who has joined us

as admin support and Sarah Bristow,

Hannah Buffam, Natalie Phillips and

Megan Sim who have joined our internal

sales team!

Congratulations to all of you!

I KNOW WHAT YOU

DID LAST WEEKEND… Our Corporate Solutions retreat in February was full of

screams, weapons, policemen and Murder!

A weekend that we spent trying to win quizzes, crack

codes, and decipher clues got us working together as a

team to try and crack the case.

A lovely way to spend more time with our clients and

colleagues, although probably best to stick to watching

CSI from now on!

LADIES WHO SHOP

To start off the Spring we ladies were lucky enough to

obtain L.K.Bennett at the Royal Exchange, London for a

night of private shopping!

With so many gorgeous outfits, bags and shoes on offer it

was hard not to walk away with the store, and I for one

certainly indulged in a lovely relaxing hand massage by a

beauty partner from Oskia.

We received great feedback from all the ladies who

shopped with us, who loved the bubbly, Pimm’s, canapés

and the relaxed atmosphere of the private shopping event!

Thursday, 15 May 2014 4

SPORTS PAGE

Following the success of our previous golf day at Woburn last September, this year we are

bringing you the ‘The John Conteh Golf Classic Series’. Five events over 2 years will

determine the five winning teams that will receive an all-expenses paid trip to Orlando, Florida

to play in the Grand Final in October 2015! Plus as an added bonus, the Best Individual over

the series will also be invited to join the winning teams in Orlando!

The series will be in aid of The John Conteh Foundation which benefits charities large and

small. The first event on 24th April 2014 was a great success! The winners of the fantastic trip

to Florida as well as top of the range golf shoes and club shirts were the 7Sense team headed

up by Mike Scott! Dave Woods, Keith Osgood (who also walked away with £100 voucher for

bagging Best Individual) and Angus Dudgeon were his thrilled team mates. Angus said “The

concept of this tournament is terrific and it’s such a great cause so I hope to see you all at the

next one and the next one after that!”

Series Dates

24th April 2014 at Lambourne Club

13th June 2014 at Celtic Manor

26th September 2014 at Forest of Arden

2nd

April 2015 at Woburn

26th June 2015 at Bovey Castle

During the tournament players came across various charity holes:

Congratulations to Gordon Young from the GB Music team, who

won the Nearest the Pin, and to Simon Davies from Anchor Press,

who won the Longest Drive. Our 13th hole, unlucky for some, was

home to our Golf Pro Mark Stokes (Pictured left- furthest right) who

players had to ‘beat’ by getting nearer to the pin than him. Unlucky

for most, but out of 64 players congratulations to the lucky 13: Zane

Flanagan, Dave Hughes, David Arnold, Keith Osgood, Steve Archer,

Gwyn Wright, Jeff Martin, Damien Bradbury, Mick Green, Leigh

Hinton, Kyle Trainer and Debbie Pollard-Barns who all ‘Beat The

Pro’.

Sponsored by:

Golf Pro, Mark Stokes

Lambourne Golf Club

John Conteh (left) and his team with

our golf pro Mark Stokes (right)