UK Uncut targets Topshop and Vodafone over tax arrangements

Demonstrators from the UK Uncut group inside Topshop on Oxford Street, central London, during a demonstration against the tax arrangements of Arcadia group owner Sir Philip Green. Photograph: Dominic Lipinski/PA

With superglue and megaphones, pop-up protests forced several branches of Topshop and Vodafone around the country to close today on one of the busiest trading days of the year.

Campaigners staged a sit-in at Sir Philip Green's flagship London Topshop store, and in Brighton a few glued themselves to the branch windows, while other high streets in towns and cities across Britain saw similar protests in a day of action against the tax arrangements of rich individuals and big businesses.

Green, the Arcadia retail group tycoon, and other wealthy individuals and big businesses including Vodafone, Barclays and Boots are the focus of rising anger over the programme of government cuts that campaigners say could be avoided if tax dodging was stamped out, bringing in some £25bn a year to the public purse and making a sizeable dent in the national debt.

Security guards in Oxford Street bundled protesters and journalists, including Guardian columnist Polly Toynbee, out of the London store before the group of about 70 to 80 protestors, chanting "Philip Green pay your tax", left voluntarily and moved on the Arcadia's BhS store, which also had to be closed briefly to shoppers, as did a Vodafone shop. The demonstrations remained good-natured and peaceful with many of those out shopping fairly sympathetic.

The billionaire Green, recently made an adviser on cuts by David Cameron, is under fire because his wife, Arcadia's direct owner, lives in the tax haven of Monaco.

The latest tax avoidance protests took place in Birmingham, Glasgow, York, Bristol, Manchester and Nottingham, under the banner of UK Uncut – a fast-growing movement that is gathering support via social networking sites

One protester, Ed Greens, 20, from north-west London, said: "Topshop ... together with companies like Vodafone owe billions. We are taking direct action on companies like Topshop which avoid large amounts of tax."

Eileen Smith, 78, had come along to join the protesters. "I support anyone who is fighting against these terrible cuts. How dare this government say we are all in this together when 24 members of the cabinet are millionaires and men like Philip Green and his cronies are feted. The hypocrisy is sickening."

The group held similar protests against Vodafone in October after the telecoms group settled a large tax avoidance claim with the government but ended up paying a lot less than had been expected.

James Kelly, a spokesman for UK Uncut said: "Tax avoidance is a big issue and we believe this is the alternative to the cuts the government are making. Philip Green is a well-known tax avoider and today we're bringing our campaign right to the heart of his empire."

Richard Murphy, director of Tax Research UK, said he thought that UK Uncut's actions were justified. "I do think that what they're doing is appropriate, I do think there's a problem. Large businesses are paying a smaller proportion of their income in tax than many individuals and small businesses in the UK and that's unacceptable."

Public and Commercial Services union general secretary Mark Serwotka said: "People are rightly angry that the government is targeting the most vulnerable in our society with massive cuts in spending, and yet it appears to be very relaxed about rich and powerful tax dodgers."