David Cameron is facing a sleaze investigation after finally being forced to admit he had a £30,000 stake in his late father's offshore fund.

The Prime Minister has been reported to the Parliamentary Standards Commissioner over allegations that he should have declared the shareholding.

After days of failing to kill off questions, Mr Cameron dramatically confessed last night that he had profited from the Bahamas-based company.

He also conceded that some of the £300,000 left to him by Ian Cameron may have come from funds kept offshore.

Labour MPs insisted Mr Cameron should consider his position, accusing him of being 'less than honest' and 'speaking out of both sides of his mouth'.

David Cameron visited a building contractors in Oxfordshire today as Downing Street raced to prepare his tax returns for publication and it emerged he could face a parliamentary standards probe

Backbencher John Mann called for Mr Cameron to 'resign immediately' and said he had referred the issue to commissioner Kathryn Hudson.

'No interpretation of his actions could conclude that he has acted in an 'open and frank' way, in line with the Code of Conduct for MPs,' he said.

'It is only now, with the Panama revelations, that David Cameron has been forced to admit that he did not register his financial interests.'

'This is a matter of transparency and integrity. David Cameron has shown neither of these qualities and should resign as Prime Minister.'

Downing Street made clear the Prime Minister believed he had declared everything in accordance with rules.

Sent out to defend the premier in a round of interviews earlier, business minister Nick Boles claimed his 'natural human reaction' had been to avoid sullying his father's reputation.

But he said 'with the benefit of hindsight' Mr Cameron should have confessed to the previous interest in the Blairmore investment fund.

In an bombshell TV interview last night, Mr Cameron said he and his wife Samantha had jointly held a stake in his father's investment fund, Blairmore, which was registered in Panama and operated out of the Bahamas.

SHOULD THE PM HAVE DECLARED SHARES IN FATHER'S OFFSHORE FUND? Labour backbencher John Mann has called for the Prime Minister to resign David Cameron has been referred to the parliamentary standards commissioner for failing to declare his stake in Blairmore. Mr Cameron has said that he bought the shares in his father's investment vehicle in 1997, and sold them in January 2010 for £31,500 - a £19,000 profit. Under Commons rules, MPs are obliged to register a shareholding that is greater than 15 per cent of a company or worth more than their annual salary. The guidance does state that 'collective investment vehicles' are 'not generally registrable'. However, the rules also stress that it is 'sometimes appropriate to register shareholdings falling outside' those categories. Politicians are reminded that the purpose of the register is 'to provide information of any financial interest or other material benefit which a Member receives which might reasonably be thought by others to influence his or her actions, speeches or votes in Parliament, or actions taken in his or her capacity as an MP'. Labour MP John Mann said: 'David Cameron has broken the rules on Standards in Public Life that he, along with me and others, voted for. 'No interpretation of his actions could conclude that he has acted in an 'open and frank' way, in line with the Code of Conduct for MPs. 'It is only now, with the Panama revelations, that David Cameron has been forced to admit that he did not register his financial interests.' 'This is a matter of transparency and integrity. David Cameron has shown neither of these qualities and should resign as Prime Minister.' Shadow work and pensions secretary Owen Smith said: 'Why didn't he register his interest in this offshore (fund) back in 2005 when he first became an MP? 'He says he's going to publish his tax return. I think he will need to go further and be clear about what his investments have been in the past.' Advertisement

He said they had sold the shares in January 2010 – four months before he became Prime Minister – for £31,500, pocketing a tax-free profit of just over £19,000 on the deal.

He also pledged to release his personal tax return in an attempt to limit the damage from his revelation.

But he insisted that he had paid all UK taxes due on his investment during the 13 years he held it.

In the next few days aides are expected to publish a summary of Mr Cameron's tax affairs going back to before the 2010 election.

LABOUR LEADER REFUSES TO ANSWER QUESTIONS ABOUT PM Jeremy Corbyn has been criticised for losing his temper with journalists seeking a comment on David Cameron's tax haven issues. Emerging from his north London home in cycling gear today, the Labour leader was met by a group of reporters and a camera crew. A series of questions were thrown at him about the row that has engulfed the Prime Minister since details of his father's offshore fund were revealed. But Mr Corbyn seemed unwilling to take advantage of his Tory opponent's difficult situation. Wearing a cycle helmet and wheeling his bike out of the front door in Islington, the veteran left-winger insisted: 'Good morning everybody. Thank you for coming ... I don't do interviews in any circumstances.' Pushing away a recording device being wielded by one reporter, Mr Corbyn said irritably: 'Put it away please.' He then cycled away down the road as a journalist plaintively called after him: 'Any reactions to David Cameron's statements last night Mr Corbyn? Should Mr Cameron resign?' Advertisement

Mr Boles said Mr Cameron's reluctance to give full details had been a 'natural human thing' when people were 'attacking his father'.

'It's only natural and human that when these revelations were first published, when people started attacking his father who died six years ago, who he loves very much and who can't defend himself, to not want to intrude on his father's memory,' he told BBC Radio 4's Today programme. 'People will understand that he is a son as well as a Prime Minister.'

But he added: 'With the benefit of hindsight he would rather that all of what has come out of the last four days would have come out on the first day.'

Shadow work and pensions secretary Owen Smith said Mr Cameron had to come to the parliament on Monday and explain his actions.

'If he was not trying to hide something why didn't he confess to this at the beginning of the week?' he said.

Mr Smith dismissed suggestions that Blairmore was a 'plain, vanilla investment', saying the 'whole point of having an offshore vehicle like this is to limit tax'.

Labour's deputy leader Tom Watson said that Mr Cameron should repay at least part of the profits he made from offshore investments – and questioned why he had taken six years to reveal them.

Mr Watson said: 'After days of repeatedly avoiding the issue, this is an extraordinary admission from the Prime Minister.

'David Cameron, who described the use of complex tax avoidance schemes as 'morally wrong', has been forced to admit that he held shares in a fund now linked to tax avoidance.

'People want a Government that clamps down on tax avoidance and they want a Prime Minister who upholds the highest standards. At the moment we seem to have neither.'

Lib Dem leader Tim Farron said: 'For ordinary taxpayers to have faith in the system they have to be able to have faith in their leaders.

'They deserve better than half-truths and qualified statements.'

Downing Street has spent all week dealing with questions on the Prime Minister's tax affairs following revelations on Monday that Ian Cameron was named in the so-called 'Panama Papers'.

Blairmore was named after the house in Huntly, Aberdeenshire, where Ian Cameron was born in 1932.

Prime Minister David Cameron greets his father Ian during the election campaign in 2010. He died in September that year

Mr Cameron made his admission in a TV interview with ITV's political editor Robert Peston, left with the PM

'I SHOULD DEAL WITH THE PAST AS WELL' – HOW CAMERON SQUIRMED IN TV INTERVIEW David Cameron finally admitted to profiting from investments in offshore tax havens in an interview with ITV's political editor Robert Peston last night. Here are the key exchanges: Robert Peston: Have the disclosures about Blairmore, the company set up by your father in the Bahamas and Panama, been embarrassing to you? David Cameron: It has been a difficult few days, reading criticisms of my father and his business practices – my dad was a man I love and admire and miss every day. I think a lot of the criticisms are based on a fundamental misconception, which is that Blairmore, a unit trust, was set up with the idea of avoiding tax. It wasn't. It was set up after exchange controls went so that people who wanted to invest in dollar-denominated companies could do so. RP: The effect of Blairmore's structure meant it didn't pay tax. Is that wrong? DC: The point is that it was a unit trust. So the money it had was other people's money on which they pay tax. If you were a United Kingdom owner of these things you paid income tax on your dividends and you paid tax in the normal way. I have been very clear about the future. I have said I am not going to benefit from any family trusts. I have been very clear about the present, I don't own any shares, I don't own any unit trusts or any investments like that. I own two homes – one of which I rent out – and I have a salary as prime minister. But I should deal with the past as well. Because of course I did own stocks and shares in the past – quite naturally because my father was a stockbroker. I sold them all in 2010, because if I was going to become Prime Minister I didn't want anyone to say you have other agendas, vested interests. Samantha and I have a joint account. We owned 5000 units in Blairmore Investment Trust, which we sold in January 2010. That was worth something like £30,000. RP: Was there a profit on it? DC: I paid income tax on the dividends. There was a profit on it but it was less than the capital gains tax allowance so I didn't pay capital gains tax. But it was subject to all the UK taxes in all the normal way. RP: So, I am sorry to press you on this but part of your dad's estate was in Jersey when he died. Did you benefit from that? DC: He left me some money, very generously, quite a lot of money. It was £300,000. I obviously can't point to every source of every bit of the money, and Dad isn't around to ask the questions now. If people want information about my tax return, I can tell you what goes on mine. And I said before the last election, if we want to move to a situation where prime ministers and potential prime ministers publish this information, I am very happy to do that. So I hope I have dealt with the future, present and the past. I've frankly been more transparent about these things than any prime minister in the past. RP: So you can't be certain some of that £300,000 didn't come from offshore sources? DC: Well he had investments in Blairmore. RP: And in Jersey? DC: Well that was because of another unit trust, again established to UK standards, and many people have those investments. But in all of this I've never hidden the fact that I am a very lucky person. I had wealthy parents who gave me a great upbringing. Who paid for me to go to an amazing school. I have never tried to be anything I am not. Advertisement

The company was incorporated in the secretive Panama jurisdiction in 1982 and operated out of the tax haven of the Bahamas.

The firm hired Bahamas residents, including a bishop, to sign off paperwork and held meetings in the Caribbean.

The arrangement, while legal, allowed the company to avoid paying UK tax for decades.

The fund also made use of 'bearer shares' which enable people to hide their assets.

On Monday No 10 said the Cameron family's dealings in Blairmore were a 'private matter'.

The Prime Minister and Downing Street then issued three further statements over the following 48 hours in a bid to close down the growing controversy.

But on each occasion, they avoided key questions about whether the PM's family had benefited from offshore investments in the past.

As the questions continued to mount, Mr Cameron yesterday decided to make a full statement of his affairs.

Labour's John Mann suggested Mr Cameron should resign over his 'hypocrisy' on tax avoidance

Treasury select committee member Wes Streeting questioned why it had taken days for the facts to be 'dragged out' of Mr Cameron

Labour's Paul Flynn also questioned why the truth from Mr Cameron was 'delayed'

He told ITV News: 'Samantha and I ... owned 5,000 units in Blairmore Investment Trust, which we sold in January 2010. That was worth something like £30,000.'

No 10 said Mr and Mrs Cameron had invested £12,497 in Blairmore in April 1997. They sold the shares in January 2010 for £31,500, yielding a capital gain of £19,003. They paid no tax on the profit because it came in just under their joint tax-free capital gains allowance which stood at £20,200 at the time.

No 10 said the Camerons did pay income tax on the unspecified annual dividends they received from the fund over the 13 years they held the investment.

FOUR STATEMENTS IN THREE DAYS – AND STILL THE PM HAD A CONFESSION TO MAKE LAST NIGHT Downing Street issued four statements in 48 hours on the Prime Minister's tax affairs as it tried to shut down the row about his late father's dealings in tax havens. Statement One 11am, Monday Asked if the Cameron family still had money in his late father's offshore fund identified in the Panama Papers, the PM's spokesman said: 'That is a private matter. I will focus on what the government is doing.' Statement Two. 2.30pm, Tuesday Asked if he or his family had benefited from any offshore fund in the past, or would do so in the future, Mr Cameron said: 'In terms of my own financial affairs, I own no shares. I have a salary as prime minister and I have some savings, which I get some interest from, and I have a house which we let out while we are living in Downing Street, and that's all I have. I have no shares, no offshore trusts, no offshore funds, nothing like that. And, so that, I think, is a very clear description.' Statement Three. 5pm, Tuesday No 10 said: 'To be clear, the Prime Minister, his wife and their children do not benefit from any offshore funds. The Prime Minister owns no shares. As has been previously reported, Mrs Cameron owns a small number of shares connected to her father's land, which she declares on her tax return.' Statement Four. 9am, Wednesday A Downing Street spokesman said: 'There are no offshore funds/trusts which the Prime Minister, Mrs Cameron or their children will benefit from in future.' Advertisement

Mr Cameron said he was 'proud' of his stockbroker father, who had been 'unfairly written about'.

The PM said there was a 'fundamental misconception' about the way Blairmore operated, saying it had not been set up to avoid tax.

He said: 'It was set up after exchange controls went, so that people who wanted to invest in dollar-denominated shares and companies could do so, and there are many other, thousands of other unit trusts set up in this way.'

It emerged this week that Ian Cameron also left assets in the tax haven of Jersey when he died in 2010. The Prime Minister yesterday admitted that all or part of the £300,000 left to him by his father might have come from offshore assets.

'I obviously can't point to every source of every bit of money and Dad's not around for me to ask the questions now,' he said.

Mr Cameron said that a promise to publish details of his tax return, which was first made four years ago, would now be acted on. Sources said the publication could come within days, although senior ministers will not be asked to follow suit.

Last night's revelations have damaged the Prime Minister.

Labour MP Paul Flynn said: 'Statement 6 by PM to ITV drags out truth that he inherited £300,000 from his father who profited from tax havens.

'Why was truth delayed?.'

Treasury select committee member Wes Streeting said: 'David Cameron keeps saying he has nothing to hide. So why are facts being dragged out of him over days?!'

In a bid to close down a toxic row over tax avoidance earlier this week, Mr Cameron made an extraordinary public statement about his personal finances and income - insisting he received no money from shares or offshore trusts.

But the claims only suggested more questions and Downing Street was forced to issue a string of further clarifications - making a total of four statements.

Ian Cameron was named in the massive leak of more than 11 million files from the Panama tax haven.

Shortly before his death the former stockbroker personally owned more than 6,000 shares in a Jersey fund he helped to manage, known by various names including the Close International Equity Growth Fund.

DOWNING STREET SCRAMBLING TO PUBLISH DETAILS OF PM'S TAX RETURN Summaries of David Cameron's tax returns from the past six years are expected to be released within days after he agreed they should be published. The Prime Minister has been insisting for years that he is 'relaxed' about the prospect of disclosing the information. But the details have never actually emerged - with officials citing concerns about setting a precedent and turning people off entering public life. London Mayor Boris Johnson and current candidate for the job Zac Goldsmith have both published records of their income and dealings with HM Revenue & Customs. Number 10 are set to publish a summary of the information rather than copies of the returns themselves. Mr Cameron said: 'If people want information about my tax return, I can tell you what goes on mine. And I said before the last election, if we want to move to a situation where prime ministers and potential prime ministers publish this information, I am very happy to do that. 'So I hope I have dealt with the future, present and the past. I've frankly been more transparent about these things than any prime minister in the past.' Advertisement

The assets in Jersey were left to the Prime Minister's mother Mary in 2010, leaving open the possibility that Mr Cameron could eventually benefit from it in the form of an inheritance.

The leaked papers revealed Ian Cameron's firm Blairmore Holdings avoided UK tax for years by operating out of the Bahamas and Jersey.

Under Jersey law, the value of the assets does not have to be made public, but a grant of probate is normally required only for sums above £10,000.

It cannot include property but can apply to cash held in bank accounts or investments, including offshore trusts and funds, known as 'movable estate'.

According to his English will, Ian Cameron left everything to his widow Mary, apart from specific bequests to the Prime Minister and his sisters.

Legal sources said the terms of the will meant any Jersey assets were most likely to have gone to Mrs Cameron.

Downing Street's final statement yesterday said the Prime Minister and his family will not benefit in the future from any offshore funds.

But tax experts said funds held in Jersey would have grown more quickly, as dividend payments would not have been subject to tax.

If Mr Cameron inherits anything from his mother it could then be argued that he has benefited from the offshore Jersey assets.

Chartered accountant and tax lecturer Robert Leach said: 'It's quite possible that Mr Cameron and his siblings could benefit from money held offshore if they inherit any of Mary Cameron's estate.

'If this happens it will be difficult to reconcile this with the Prime Minister's statement.'

There are legitimate reasons to hold money and other assets offshore and there is no suggestion of illegality or wrongdoing by any member of the Cameron family.

Documents filed in 2009 showed Ian Cameron held at least 6,000 shares in the Jersey fund – the first time he was shown to have personally held wealth offshore rather than managing funds like Blairmore Holdings in Panama.

After his death, the net value of his estate was put at £2.7million. He left £300,000 in cash – just under the threshold at which inheritance tax is paid – to David.

A £1million mews house in Kensington, West London, was left to the Prime Minister's sisters Tania and Clare.

The remainder of his estate was left to Mrs Cameron.

The £2.5million family home near Newbury in Berkshire was transferred to the Prime Minister's older brother Alex in 2006, in an apparent attempt to reduce inheritance tax liabilities.

Labour has repeatedly called for Downing Street to publish the full details of Mr Cameron's links to Blairmore.

Mr Leach said that the Prime Minister needed to say if the £300,000 he received from his father's will 'was the proceeds of a scheme that avoided tax'.

He added: 'The answer is probably yes as he would have denied it otherwise.

But even then he has not done anything illegal, although it is politically embarrassing.

Tax havens and the 10 questions Cameron's failed to answer

By Jason Groves, Deputy Political Editor for The Daily Mail

1 Why, if he had nothing to hide, did it take David Cameron four days to admit he owned shares in an offshore investment fund?

In recent years the Prime Minister has championed a crackdown on tax avoidance, which made it politically embarrassing for him to admit he once had money invested in a tax haven. But in hindsight he must wish he had been more open about his shareholding in Blairmore – his late father’s offshore investment fund – from the start.

Downing Street’s handling of the crisis gave the impression of a Prime Minister caught on the back foot and unwilling to give a straight answer. He issued four statements in 48 hours before finally being forced to make his TV confession.

2 Was Blairmore a vehicle for tax avoidance?

Mr Cameron said it was a ‘fundamental misconception’ that the Blairmore trust was set up to avoid tax. But its own 2006 prospectus for investors – published while the Prime Minister was still a shareholder – made clear the trust had no intention of paying tax in Britain.

It said: ‘The directors intend that the affairs of the fund should be managed and conducted so that it does not become resident in the United Kingdom for UK taxation purposes.

‘The fund will not be subject to United Kingdom corporation tax or income tax on its profits.’

Blairmore was registered in Panama and based in the Bahamas, where locals were retained to fill roles such as treasurer and secretary. Board meetings were held in Switzerland and Nassau in the Bahamas.

Financial expert Richard Murphy, a professor of international political economy at City University, said it was ‘completely disingenuous’ to suggest Blairmore was not set up to avoid tax.

He said: ‘There was a tax avoidance motive and it delivered tax avoidance.’

3 Why did Mr Cameron invest offshore in the first place, if not to limit his tax bill?

Mr Cameron said it was ‘quite natural’ for him to have owned stocks and shares, particularly as his father Ian was a stockbroker.

But investors choose offshore funds specifically because they are sheltered from the higher tax burdens they would incur in Britain.

While Mr Cameron would have been liable for income tax on and dividends received and capital gains tax on any profits when he sold, the funds themselves are not liable to any tax, so grow more quickly than those based onshore.

Mr Cameron also said the fund was set up so people could invest in ‘dollar-denominated shares’, but it could easily have done that from Britain rather than the Bahamas.

4 If Blairmore was not trying to avoid tax then why did it use secretive ‘bearer shares’, which have since been banned from the UK?

Bearer shares, which Blairmore is known to have issued, do not carry the name of the owner and are similar to bank notes in that they are instantly transferable without paperwork.

That anonymity meant they were popular with tax evaders and money launderers, although there is no suggestion of any wrongdoing linked to Blairmore or the Cameron family.

The use of bearer shares was common in offshore funds at that time but they have since been banned from use in Britain – by Mr Cameron’s government.

5 What was Mr Cameron’s total return from these investments, including profits he drew out between 1997 and 2010 – when he sold his shares?

The 5,000 shares Mr Cameron owned in a joint account with his wife Samantha were bought for £12,497 in April 1997 and sold for £31,500 in 2010.

The profit of £19,003 was below the capital gains tax threshold. Mr Cameron said he paid income tax on annual dividends from the fund, but it is not known how much he received. He has not revealed what profits, if any, he drew between 1997 and 2010, so the total value of his Blairmore investment remains unknown.

6 Why didn’t he declare his Blairmore shares in the register of MPs’ interests?

The register is intended to provide information about ‘any financial interest which a member has, or any benefit which he or she receives, which others might reasonably consider to influence his or her actions or words as a member of Parliament’.

Before 2010 it only required politicians to declare shareholdings valued at more than £65,000.

But critics suggested Mr Cameron should have declared his Blairmore holdings while he was leader of the Opposition, when his personal interests and agendas were already under increased scrutiny.

Mr Cameron became an MP in 2001 and leader of the Conservatives in 2005.

He sold his Blairmore shares in 2010, the year he became Prime Minister, because he did not want to be open to accusations of serving his own ‘vested interests’, he said.

In the month before he became Prime Minister, his register of interests included a gift of silver goblets from Lord Harris of Peckham, a rug from a former prime minister of Pakistan and a Christmas hamper from the Sultan of Brunei, but not his shareholdings.

7 Did he have any other offshore investments during or before his time as an MP?

Mr Cameron said he had owned ‘stocks and shares in the past’ but did not say if he had held any other offshore investments.

When he became an MP in 2001 he declared that he owned shares in Carlton Communications, where he had worked as a consultant on ‘Press and investor issues’.

He and his wife were said to have sold their Blairmore units as part of a wider disposal of assets, before he became Prime Minister. But Mr Cameron has yet to give any details of any other assets.

8 Was the money left to him by his father partly or wholly the product of investments in tax havens?

Mr Cameron was left a £300,000 cash bequest in his father’s will in 2010 – just under the inheritance tax threshold.

Ian Cameron is known to have earned a salary of 20,000 US dollars as a director of Blairmore. He also had shares in Blairmore Asset Management in Geneva and a fund in the tax haven of Jersey which he helped to manage.

The Prime Minister conceded he could not account for ‘every source of every bit’ of his £300,000 inheritance, adding: ‘Dad isn’t around to ask the question now.’

But it’s impossible to imagine that his affluent lifestyle and cash inheritance were not funded – at least in part – by his father’s involvement with offshore investments.

9 What has happened to the money his father had invested in Jersey?

Ian Cameron owned 6,000 shares in an offshore fund he helped to manage in Jersey, the Close International Equity Growth Fund.

Under Jersey law the full value of his assets in the tax haven were not revealed in a ‘grant of probate’ issued after his death, but the document is usually only required for sums above £10,000.

Ian Cameron’s widow Mary is thought to have inherited his Jersey assets, but Downing Street has refused to say if they were brought onshore of if she is still the beneficiary of an offshore trust.

David Cameron said he would not benefit in the future from any family trusts, or from offshore funds. But if he inherits anything from his mother, it could then be argued he has benefited from the Jersey assets.

Chartered accountant and tax lecturer Robert Leach said: ‘We obviously need more details.’

10 Why has he still not published his tax return, four years after he first promised to do so?

Mr Cameron says he’s ‘relaxed’ about publishing information from his tax returns but we still haven’t seen them.

He made a similar statement in 2012, when opponents demanded he reveal whether he and senior colleagues would benefit personally from the reduction in the 50p top rate of income tax.