US coffee giant Starbucks came under attack in a British parliamentary commission on Monday for using the Netherlands to get round British taxes.

According to the Daily Mail, Starbucks has paid just £8.6m tax in Britain after 14 years of trading.
British MPs are angry Starbucks UK pays a 4.7% fee to the coffee giant’s Dutch arm for the right to use its branding and coffee recipe. The fee, which the paper says has been as high as 6%, reduces its UK tax bill.
Tax deal
CFO Troy Alstead told the commission his firm had a deal with the Dutch government that gives Starbucks a special tax rate in Amsterdam.
The terms of the bargain, he said, were ‘iron bound in confidentiality’, and he that he couldn’t reveal them in the open hearing.
Starbucks European headquarters and its roasting facility for Europe, the Middle-East and Africa are located in Amsterdam.