From: <b class="gmail_sendername">Luke Holland</b> <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:lholland@cesr.org">lholland@cesr.org</a>></span><br><div class="gmail_quote">
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<p class="MsoNormal"><b><span lang="EN-GB">Europe
moves forward on Robin Hood Tax while US Secretaries Clinton and Geithner balk</span></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">Europe’s much talked-about financial
transactions tax has come one step closer after a coalition of 11 countries –
including France, Germany, Italy and Spain – agreed
to move ahead with the initiative despite the opposition of several other
states. A number of countries, such as Britain and Sweden, remain opposed to
the ‘FTT’, but at a meeting of European Union finance ministers on Tuesday its
proponents decided to avail of the EU’s ‘enhanced cooperation’ facility,
thereby clearing the way for officials to begin designing the mechanism.</span></p>
<p><span style="font-family:Cambria" lang="EN-US"><br>
Much work remains to be done if the FTT
is eventually to become a more widespread reality, however, as certain key
states remain reticent. Indeed representatives of the world’s largest economy
have been accused to trying to convince other countries not to go ahead with
it. In a joint
letter (see: <a href="http://www.cesr.org/downloads/ftt.clinton.joint.letter.pdf?preview=1" target="_blank">http://www.cesr.org/downloads/ftt.clinton.joint.letter.pdf?preview=1</a>) to US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Secretary of the
Treasury Tim Geithner, CESR joined a large group of US civil society
organizations such as ActionAid, Friends of the Earth US, </span><span style="font-family:Cambria" lang="EN-US">Grassroots Global Justice Alliance, National Nurses United and Tax Justice Network USA</span><span style="font-family:Cambria" lang="EN-US"> to call on the US government to stop discouraging
other nations from considering an FTT. The letter was issued after a US
official made misleading statements, insisting that the FTT was not feasible.
Paul Bodnar—a<span> </span></span><span style="font-family:Cambria" lang="EN-US">member of the
US climate negotiating team</span><span style="font-family:Cambria" lang="EN-US">—argued
at a recent UN meeting on climate change financing that it would be all but
impossible to implement the FTT globally, and that financial traders would find
ways to circumvent it anyway. He also affirmed that finance for climate change
mitigation — one of they central motivations cited by those advocating for the
FTT – should be directly linked to emissions. His arguments are rebuffed in the
joint letter, which was signed by some 63 civil society organizations. Such
taxes do not have to be global to be effective,
as demonstrated by the fact that they are already up and running in many
countries, and international financial transactions are actually relatively
easy to monitor. The idea that a tax must be directly linked to the source of
taxation, meanwhile, is patently erroneous. The weight of the civil society
initiative, led by Friends of the Earth, was reflected in extensive
media
coverage
as influentia institutions such as Bloomberg
reported on the letter (see: <a href="http://www.businessweek.com/news/2012-09-28/clinton-urged-to-support-robin-hood-tax-to-fund-climate" target="_blank">http://www.businessweek.com/news/2012-09-28/clinton-urged-to-support-robin-hood-tax-to-fund-climate</a>). </span></p>
<p><span style="font-family:Cambria" lang="EN-US"> Civil society has
also targetted World Bank President Jim Yong Kim in a joint
letter (see: <a href="http://www.cesr.org/downloads/Civil%20Society%20Letter%20to%20Dr%20Kim%20on%20FTT.pdf?preview=1" target="_blank">http://www.cesr.org/downloads/Civil%20Society%20Letter%20to%20Dr%20Kim%20on%20FTT.pdf?preview=1</a>), calling on him to use his position to champion the ‘Robin Hood
Tax’, as it has come to be known. CESR added its voice to that of 57 other
organizations by signing the communiqué, which provided yet more evidence of
the growing civil socity consensus on the practicality and importance of the
FTT. The viability of the financial transaction tax is further underlined by
the backing it has
received from many prominent economists and political actors. Support from
leading business figures like Bill
Gates and Warren
Buffett is mirrored in the endorsement of political and diplomatic leaders
such as Kofi
Annan, Al Gore
and even IMF boss Christine
Lagarde. </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">In a time when multiple crises are exacting
a devastating toll on the wellbeing of ordinary people everywhere, political
leaders would also do well to remember the human rights principles underpinning
calls for the financial transactions tax. The measure would go some way to
integrate a modicum of equality and progressivity into a system where these are
sorely lacking. Keeping in mind the role high-frequency trading has played in
provoking the food and fuel crises, not to mention ongoing economic quagmire in
which the world finds itself, the FTT could also help in preventing human
rights abuses by third parties, as is required by international human rights
law. </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB">But perhaps most obviously, the FTT is
precisely the kind of common-sense measure that would help governments comply
with their obligation to mobilise the “maximum of available resources” for the
protection of economic and social rights. It is estimated that the European FTT
could raise in excess of €57
billion (US $75 billion) a year for the protection economic and social
rights, while an FTT rolled out across the G20 group of nations could mobilise
in excess of $250
billion. </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"> To learn more about the FTT, see: <a href="http://cesr.org/downloads/FTT%20Human%20Rights%20Imperative.pdf?preview=1" target="_blank">http://cesr.org/downloads/FTT%20Human%20Rights%20Imperative.pdf?preview=1</a><br>
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<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><span> </span></span></p><br></div></div></div></div></div><br>