U2 Glastonbury Protest First Photo

Art Uncut tell Band "U Pay Tax 2"  Security Kettles 50 Protesters

U2 took to the pyramid stage In pouring rain last night. The controversy surrounding the Irish band's appearance at Glastonbury this year helped turn an unremarkable, letter perfect performance into an event of actual relevance, even if  for the wrong reasons. Other than an out of tune acapella version of the hymn Jerusalem, the concert came off well for the band. The protesters, organized by Art Uncut, unfurled banners and shouted pay your taxes to the supergroup as they performed their first song at The Glastonbury Festival. As Bono and the band were coming onto the Stage, protesters from Art Uncut inflated a 20ft balloon printed with the the slogan "U Pay Tax 2".The activists tried to display it over the crowd, but a team of security guards pounced on them, deflating the balloon and confiscating it. The heavy handed tactics by security guards took place just after U2's opening song "Until The End Of The World". Clashes with around 50 protesters carried on until they were kettled against a fence for the rest of the performance.. Michael Eavis, Glastonbury founder, said that while he encourages political activism at his festival, he believes the planned protest against U2's tax status was unfair because of all of their generous charity work.
The energetic protesters saved the day and kept the fans awake despite the heavy rain, cold and mud, which incidentally was a foot deep and the consistency of runny chocolate mousse. The activists mostly went unnoticed, overshadowed by the scale of the event, but all and all, the media attention has made it a resounding success. The millions of television viewers watching the BBC broadcast hardly noticed that anything out of the ordinary was taking place. This low keyed yet powerful statement by Art Uncut will hopefully send a clear message to every actor, band and artist in the public eye. It will undoubtedly remind them that taxes are something that benefit us all and if an artist is going to have aspirations to be one of the good and great, responsibilities begin at home. The popularity of an artist is dependent on an audience that engages with the artist. It is the public that buy their albums, go to see their films and pay to see their live performances. It seems that Art Uncut the Irish protest group has a bigger message at large. U2 have been singled out as a high profile target and by hitting this raw nerve one can only hope that Bono,The Edge and co will think twice about moving money to safe tax havens in the future. Bono is publically known for being concerned with development. But tax issues are crucial to development. Christian Aid estimates that developing countries lose $160bn annually, more than the global aid budget, thanks to unscrupulous multinational companies dodging tax. Fellow campaigner Charlie Dewar said: “U2’s multimillion-euro tax dodge is depriving the Irish people at a time when they desperately need income to offset the Irish government’s savage austerity programme.

Art Uncut has stated that Before 2006 U2 Ltd, which deals with U2's royalties payments, was registered in Ireland, the band's native country, for tax purposes. At the time, Ireland had an astonishing policy of allowing artists to pay zero tax on royalties. In 2006, the Irish government decided to cap the income which can be subject to this exemption at 250,000 Euros per annum. Following this change in the law, U2 Ltd decided to move their tax affairs to Holland in order to pay less tax. In the world we live in today, nations compete with each other to undercut one another's tax rates. States allow themselves to be played off against each other by big business and wealthy individuals: 'Please don't leave to go to Switzerland! Here, have more of the money that could be spent on schools, hospitals and public services', says George Osborne as he slashes corporation taxes by 2%. Of course in the short term one country may increase its tax intake by undercutting the tax rates of another country, but this is done only at the expense of that other country, which has lost business by not offering a high enough ransom to persuade it to stay. And globally, over time, this process inevitably results in an ever-dwindling proportion of profits going to governments to spend on the public good.

If the nations of the world decided to cooperate rather than compete, they would have everything to gain. If every country in the world agreed to impose a progressive corporation rate on business with a top rate of, say, 50%, they would secure many, many times more revenue. Big business would have nowhere to run, and so would lose its power to dictate to governments how to set their tax rates. In democracies, the power to choose the tax law would be returned to the people. The painful decisions nations currently face over how to spend their ever dwindling share of global profits would be a thing of the past. Bono, with all of his global knowledge knows this, he should do the right thing and pay his taxes.

Art Uncut was founded to make the kind of societal model that we believe to be better: a society with well-funded arts, well-funded public services, and where there is a certain amount of redistribution so that the gap between rich and poor does not get too wide. They began as a small group of artists and musicians involved in UK Uncut actions, but hope now to open up the anti-cuts movement to a broader audience: to those who are not temperamentally inclined to protest, or perhaps haven't made their minds up yet. If we are serious about building a broad, sustained coalition of opposition with the potential for political influence, we need to reach out.