The “Robin Hood tax” is a micro tax of 0.005% on foreign exchange transactions between banks, i.e. a minute automatic deduction which has little or no affect on trade but which, considering the huge sums of money involved, would allow us to raise a considerable amount of money. NGOs are asking the European Union to put into operation this tax on exchange transactions between banks which work with the Euro. As the PLUS coalition reminds us: “Foreign exchange transactions already have an automatic deduction (…) but it is even lower than 0.005% and is only used for the computer systems used by banks for exchanging currencies”.

In 2009, the total amount resulting from exchange transactions involving the Euro were twenty times higher than the GDP (Gross Domestic Product) of the European Union. 97% of exchanges between banks correspond to speculation on micro movements in different currencies. “The European Union has the power to unilaterally tax transactions involving its own currency, as all these transactions pass through banks located in the European Union. For instance, The West African Monetary Union has already put into operation a tax on foreign exchange transactions involving the CFA franc which finance development”, The PLUS coalition explains.

 

Huge amounts of money. According to the economist, Rodney Schmidt of Toronto University, the Robin tax on foreign exchanges involving only the Euro would bring in 12 billion euros a year.

 

In March 2009 the Global Fund to fight Aids, Malaria and Tuberculosis published the amount of finance needed by developing countries in the next three years. It needs 35 billion dollars. The Robin tax on the euro can yield this amount and compensate for the withdrawal of donor countries to the Global Fund who have reneged on their pledges and deserted the coffers of the Global Fund.

 

Clearly it is; Contrary to what people may think, there is, according to the PLUS coalition, a “real wish on the part of public opinion to use public money to put an end to the worst injustices, like six million people dying each year from treatable illnesses such as Aids, Tuberculosis and Malaria”. The Coalition also thinks that “the increase in inequalities and resentment between the Western world and developing countries is untenable and dangerous in the long term”.

Basically, the PLUS coalition requests “the implementation of an international tax on foreign exchange transactions (the Robin tax) in order to halt the spread of HIV/Aids and allow all HIV positive people to have access to quality health care!”

Plus would like the attendees at the conference in Casablanca to sign a petition addressed to the Belgian Prime Minister, Yves Leterme, whose country has the presidency of the European Union in the second semester of 2010. The objective is for Yves to put this file on the EU agenda. In November 2009, Yves Leterme along with the French Minister for Foreign affairs, Bernard Kouchner, set up an intergovernmental group whose objective is to put into operation financial taxes in aid of  development. Furthermore, in 2004, Yves Leterme, succeeded in passing a law stating that Belgium would collect the Robin Tax as soon as it is accepted in all European Countries.

 

To put the petition into circulation and for further information: www.coalitionplus.org

 

Jean François Laforgerie