10 Reasons Why an Intergovernmental UN Tax Body Will Benefit Everyone

With thanks to GATJ

With thanks to GATJ

We have written for years about how the OECD, a club of rich countries has dominated the international tax system and that this inevitably skews the system in the favour of, well, rich countries. A potentially far more representative body exists — the UN Tax Committee — but the OECD and its member states have exerted powerful pressure to restrict its mandate and powers and to ensure that it is under-resourced, given low status, and unable to mount a challenge to rich countries’ needs. Continue reading “10 Reasons Why an Intergovernmental UN Tax Body Will Benefit Everyone” →

Sign on! Lima Declaration on Tax Justice and Human Rights

LimaVia the Global Alliance for Tax Justice:

Organisations are now invited to endorse the Lima Declaration on Tax Justice and Human Rights. Continue reading “Sign on! Lima Declaration on Tax Justice and Human Rights” →

Juncker’s hidden hand? EU tax haven blacklist omits Luxembourg

Juncker's tax haven gambit

Juncker and tax haven Luxembourg. We won’t tire of repeating this one. Hat tip: David Walch

We have often remarked how international tax haven blacklists generally reflect the political powers and influence of nation states; as a result they tend to include ‘minnows’ but not the big fish. (Among other things, this means a lot of econometric studies resting on a baseline of nonsense.)

Continue reading “Juncker’s hidden hand? EU tax haven blacklist omits Luxembourg” →

Indonesia: Financial Transparency Conference, Jakarta, October

From the Financial Transparency Coalition, of which TJN is a member:

Register and FAQ here.

Jakarta FTC

Agreement in Buenos Aires on need for public registries of beneficial ownership

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From Andres Knobel

Buenos Aires – On June 10th and 11th, Tax Justice Network together with Argentina’s General Prosecution Office (Ministerio Público Fiscal), Argentina’s Central Bank and other NGOs including Fundación SES, Latindadd and CIPCE hosted a two-day event involving Government and civil society concerning the need for registries of beneficial ownership. The event took place at one of the main halls of Argentina’s Central Bank and was one of the main gatherings of government agencies and NGOs. Continue reading “Agreement in Buenos Aires on need for public registries of beneficial ownership” →

European Commission half measures will exacerbate profit shifting

17th June 2015 – for immediate release

European Commission half measures will exacerbate profit shifting

Today’s Action Plan on Fairer Taxation sees the European Commission stall on transparency while giving tax sweeteners to multinational companies Continue reading “European Commission half measures will exacerbate profit shifting” →

Hey Walmart, it’s time to pay your taxes

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A groundbreaking report released Wednesday, June 17 (12:01am) by Americans for Tax Fairness (ATF), and researched by the United Food & Commercial Workers International Union (UFCW), reveals that Walmart has built a vast, undisclosed network of 78 subsidiaries and branches in 15 overseas tax havens, which may be used to minimize foreign taxes where it has retail operations and to avoid U.S. tax on those foreign earnings. Continue reading “Hey Walmart, it’s time to pay your taxes” →

Corporate tax and the OECD: joint statement to the G20

BMG GATJThe BEPS Monitoring Group (BMG), a body supported by TJN and led by TJN Senior Adviser Sol Picciotto, is a civil society body monitoring the OECD’s Base Erosion and Profit Shifting (BEPS) project. BEPS is fancy OECD-speak for ‘international corporate tax dodging’.

The platform has now produced a new joint statement, alongside our partners at the Global Alliance for Tax Justice (GATJ): Continue reading “Corporate tax and the OECD: joint statement to the G20” →

The politics of country-by-country reporting

Alex Cobham, TJN's esteemed Director of Research

Alex Cobham, TJN’s esteemed Director of Research

A new post by Alex Cobham, TJN’s Research Director, at Uncounted. It’s called, as our headline suggests, The politics of country-by-country reporting. In summary, the sections note: Continue reading “The politics of country-by-country reporting” →

Juncker invites himself to Luxleaks hearing

Letterbox cos

From http://dev.stopletterboxcompanies.eu. Act on June 16, and sign the petition

This blog looks at a report from EurActiv about the so-called Luxleaks probes, which are looking at whether multinational companies using Luxembourg schemes (involving so-called ‘tax rulings’) violated European rules. Jean-Claude Juncker is not only head of the European Commission, but former premier of Luxembourg. Euractiv reports that the tax rulings committee had sought to interview European Commisioner Pierre Moscovici, but it didn’t quite work out like that: Continue reading “Juncker invites himself to Luxleaks hearing” →

The Fair Tax Pledge is launched – please add your support and sign

Fair Tax Pledge logo

Fair Tax Pledge

Welcoming the launch of the Fair Tax Pledge –

As described by Richard Murphy:

The Fair Tax Pledge is a new idea from the Fair Tax Mark, of which I’m a director.

The Fair Tax Mark is aimed at those businesses that are run as limited companies but we’ve always known that there are small, unincorporated businesses and many individuals who have wanted to say that they too believe in paying the right amount of tax, in the right place, at the rate rate and at the right time but had no way of doing so. The Fair Tax Pledge puts that right.

The Fair Tax Pledge is open to anyone. It asks that you commit to:

  1. Declaring all your income and that of any companies or other organisations you’re associated with openly, honestly and on a timely basis;
  1. Not use tax havens to reduce any tax that you owe;
  1. Not use marketed or abusive tax avoidance arrangements;
  1. Not enter into any tax arrangement contrary to the spirit of the law;
  1. Advise your accountant, if you have one, that you do not want them to do anything contrary to the commitments you have made.

Read more here, and sign the pledge here.

 

Join the Global Week of Action for #TaxJustice, June 16-23

Cross-posted from our sister organisation the Global Alliance for Tax Justice

 

Global Week of Action

The Global Week of Action for #TaxJustice, which will take place in June 16-23, 2015, aims to encourage and cross-promote diverse activities that are initiated across our tax justice communities, to increase public pressure on governments across the world. Members and allies of the Global Alliance for Tax Justice are kindly invited to join this initiative and organize or participate in activities in their countries.
Continue reading “Join the Global Week of Action for #TaxJustice, June 16-23” →

Should Nation States Compete? Discussion workshop final programme

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Discussion Workshop

Should Nation States Compete?

Continue reading “Should Nation States Compete? Discussion workshop final programme” →

Are the G7 really suggesting compulsory arbitration on international tax disputes?

Christian AidChristian Aid sent us this email yesterday, and it’s a shocker. Back in 2013, the G7 made some pretty strong commitments to tax justice, and we said then we’d be watching them carefully to see if they’d deliver. Well, on this evidence, they haven’t: quite the opposite, in fact. It is worth reproducing Christian Aid’s press release in full:

Continue reading “Are the G7 really suggesting compulsory arbitration on international tax disputes?” →

In memoriam: FIFA’s stench kills free speech in Cayman

The front page of the Cayman Compass, Monday 8th June 2015

The front page of the Cayman Compass, Monday 8th June 2015

More fallout from the toxic FIFA scandal (see here, here and here).  Continue reading “In memoriam: FIFA’s stench kills free speech in Cayman” →

Luxembourg: the campaign on corporate tax has only just begun

From Eurodad: a wonderful sign that people are starting to gear up to challenge the many corporate tax abuses run out of secrecy jurisdictions like the European Dodgy Duchy of Luxembourg.

Continue reading “Luxembourg: the campaign on corporate tax has only just begun” →

OECD country-by-country reporting: Strangled at birth

The OECD's Chateau de la Muette

The OECD’s Chateau de la Muette

Sigh. Country-by-country reporting, an idea first mooted and pushed by Richard Murphy for TJN – is making slow but steady headway, in various fora internationally. The OECD, which only relatively rarely fails to disappoint, has been weighing in on this weighty affair. We now report on the latest news from this part of the front line.

From Alex Cobham’s blog, Uncounted: Continue reading “OECD country-by-country reporting: Strangled at birth” →

TJN in The Economist: on the precious corporate income tax

John Christensen

The Economist gets radical

Recently, we wrote an article welcoming a major intervention by The Economist magazine, which was arguing that rules allowing people and corporations to set interest payments against their tax bills is a historical anachronism whose time has now gone.

Continue reading “TJN in The Economist: on the precious corporate income tax” →

Australia may try to exempt wealthy via scaremongering

scaremongerThe Sydney News reports:

“The Australian government has produced draft legislation to classify the financial accounts of private wealthy families, in order to deter kidnappers.”

and there’s more, summed up by The Guardian: Continue reading “Australia may try to exempt wealthy via scaremongering” →

Norwegian Parliament votes for public registry of ownership

Stortinget,_Oslo,_Norway

 

Guest blog from Sigrid Klæboe Jacobsen of TJN Norway

On the 5th of June, a unanimous Norwegian Parliament voted for establishing a beneficial ownership registry. Continue reading “Norwegian Parliament votes for public registry of ownership” →

HSBC, money-laundering and Swiss regulatory deterrence

SwagNumber-crunching, à la Private Eye: the case of HSBC and its Swiss fine for “organisational deficiencies” in relation to money-laundering.

Not all the assets under management were laundered, of course. Far from it, we must hope. But the “organisational deficiencies” – including reassuring clients that no information would reach their home authorities, or using offshore accounts to circumvent disclosure requirements – represent risks that applied to the whole operation.

To put it another way, the fine is about a fifth of the £135 million in tax that HMRC recovered in the UK alone.

Even the prosecutor imposing the fine was embarrassed, and “launched a stinging attack” on the Swiss law that apparently prevented anything within yodeling distance of being a deterrent.

Cross-posted from Uncounted

 

 

Did KPMG spot anything amiss at FIFA?

Sepp Blatter instructs the auditors

FIFA boss Sepp Blatter instructs the auditors

From Francine McKenna:

“Of all the individuals and firms tied up in the scandal over bribery and corruption at FIFA, scrutiny has so far largely escaped KPMG, the soccer association’s external auditor.”

That’s the summary, and our quote of the day. The article continues: Continue reading “Did KPMG spot anything amiss at FIFA?” →