Cadbury's pays no UK tax – and hasn't for years

The American owner of Cadbury is facing fresh opprobrium, after it was revealed to be paying no corporate taxes in the UK.

Ongoing anger at companies seen to be flouting - and being allowed to avoid - paying their fair share of tax is also likely to rekindle distaste at the £11.5bn takeover of Cadbury back in 2009.

The deal faced stiff opposition at the time on the grounds that a well-known British business asset was falling into foreign hands.

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The Sunday Times notes that Mondelez International, formerly called Kraft Foods, paid no UK corporation tax in 2014 despite amassing £2bn in revenue.

Operating company Cadbury UK made profits of £96.5m and its holding company Cadbury Ltd paid out dividends of £1.3bn, the paper adds.

But the Financial Times explains that Mondelez paid £1.4bn in interest on an £8.2bn loan instrument listed on the Channel Islands stock exchange, which had been used to fund the original buyout.

Under a contentious tax break to attract international businesses, payments on listed European bonds are tax-deductible.

The FT notes the Treasury assessed the concession in 2012 but decided to take no action. Labour had pledged to abolish the break in the lead up to the 2015 election.

This is just one of many tricks in corporations' armouries to avoid paying taxes, however - and it would be wrong to suggest Cadbury's has only taken to the tax-planning game since being taken over by an American company.

According to the FT, the company paid an average of just £6.4m a year in tax on its UK operations in the decade before it was bought out.

The Daily Mail has found evidence that it paid £45m in a single year, which means in many of the years prior to its takeover it was similarly paying no tax at all despite generating annual profits in the region of £100m.

"In common with all global businesses we pay corporation tax based on the laws of the countries in which we operate," a spokesperson for Mondelez said. The company added that it had invested £200m in "UK jobs, science and manufacturing".

It has also been reviled for reneging on a pledge to keep open its Somerdale factory near Bristol, at the loss of around 400 jobs.