Understanding Coats
Coats’ Tax Strategy
Public scrutiny of corporate taxation has reached unprecedented levels over the past few years. Our corporate reputation is important to us, and we feel that it is crucial to be transparent in our business dealings and in particular about our approach to tax affairs.
Our company vision and goals establish what we want to achieve as a business, and our tax affairs are managed to support them. Our principles describe the way we work, and apply equally to how we manage our tax affairs, in particular being open and honest in our dealings with stakeholders and making sure we deliver on our goals, vision, and strategic objectives.
We have high expectations of ourselves, and the relationships we build with our stakeholders. We want to achieve success and look to grow through positive, global teamwork.
We operate a robust risk management framework across our business, and this approach also applies to the management of our tax affairs.
We always consider our corporate responsibilities which enable us to build and maintain our reputation, together with the trust and confidence of our employees and the people with whom we do business. The tax we pay supports the communities in which we operate.
The way we approach our tax affairs is outlined below:
At Coats, we will:
- Always engage with our stakeholders (including tax authorities, business partners, customers, analysts, the media, employees and government bodies) in an open, honest and robust manner.
- Seek to comply with both the letter and the spirit of the tax laws that govern our business, ensuring we have suitable governance and control of our operations to meet all our tax compliance obligations across all the jurisdictions in which we operate.
- Manage our tax affairs in a way which supports our corporate vision, principles and goals, and is based on genuine commercial activity. We will understand the drivers of our effective tax rate and cash tax liabilities and undertake commercially focussed transactions in an efficient way which allows us to establish a sustainable, predictable tax position which supports our growth, and is comparable to our listed peers; and
We will not:
- Take any tax positions that we would not be comfortable defending and will seek to avoid disputes with tax authorities wherever possible. When disputes arise, we will manage them in a timely manner and will defend our position robustly.
Click here to download a copy of our 2021 Group Tax Strategy