evasion
/ɪˈveɪʒ(ə)n
/noun [mass noun]
1The action of evading something: their adroit evasion of almost all questions...
- Sound tax reforms entail effective broadening of the tax base at all levels of government, including through checking evasion and avoidance.
- The office said bank secrecy did not stop the investigation of tax avoidance and evasion.
- This exception does not apply to advice concerning listed transactions or dealing with the principal purpose of tax avoidance or evasion.
Synonyms
avoidance, dodging, eluding, elusion, sidestepping, bypassing, circumvention, shunning, shirking;
getting out of, finding a way round
informal ducking, the go-by
archaic bilking
1.1 [count noun] An indirect answer; a prevaricating excuse: the protestations and evasions of a witness...
- Some Chinese history specialists were less inclined to make excuses for the evasions, however.
- And with more questions being asked than ever before, democracy demands answers not evasions.
- I gulped, and searched without success through my box of excuses, reasons and evasions.
Synonyms
prevarication, evasiveness, beating about the bush, hedging, fencing, shilly-shallying, shuffling, dodging the issue, dodging, sidestepping the issue, sidestepping, pussyfooting, equivocation, vagueness, quibbling, cavilling, temporization, stalling, stalling for time;
British humming and hawing
informal ducking, ducking the issue
rare tergiversation
Origin
Late Middle English (in the sense 'prevaricating excuse'): via Old French from Latin evasio(n-), from evadere (see evade).