OECD does collect country by country financial information. But it’s only for the very largest multinationals. Their tax truths are hidden, because it’s published in an aggregated and anonymous way, and details are only accessible to tax authorities who jump through many, many hoops. Read: most African nations do not have access.Australia shook the corporate world to its core by deciding to introduce public country by country reporting legislation: one in five companies around the globe would have had their tax truths exposed, enabling tax authorities to pore over those PDFs that had been denied to them. But the Tax Justice Network says, “the OECD may have become an outright proponent of opacity and blocker of progress, lobbying Australia to keep multinational corporations’ profit shifting behaviour out of the public eye.” The Financial Times has confirmed the OECD pressured Australia to water down rules.
You’d be forgiven if you clicked on the corporate governance structure of a multinational company and mistook the download plans for a world tour itinerary. You may find yourself starting in London on your way to Lilongwe, with layovers in Amsterdam, Road Town and Dubai, wondering how much of Virunga National Park would need saving […]
The Australian government has delayed legislation1 which would have delivered the biggest breakthrough to date in transparency on the taxes of multinational corporations. Shockingly, reports suggest that lobbying against the legislation by multinational corporations and their professional enablers may have been bolstered by the OECD itself – the organisation which claims to set international tax […]
The Financial Times has confirmed that the OECD – the international tax rulemaker – heavily lobbied to stop Australia from passing legislation that would have delivered the biggest transparency breakthrough to date on the taxes of multinational corporations.1 The OECD’s deliberate attempt to block progress on tackling tax havens will have significant implications for the […]
After two weeks of silence, the OECD has addressed1 its role in delaying breakthrough tax transparency legislation in Australia, which was confirmed this weekend in frontpage news by the Financial Times.2 Reports of the OECD heavily lobbying against the legislation were first brought to light by CICTAR and the Tax Justice Network.3 A statement was […]
Half a year later, EU member states are split in their response to the European Court of Justice’s decision to suspend the clause that guaranteed public access to beneficial ownership registers in the EU. Our new analysis shows that the split in responses mirror countries positions on our Financial Secrecy Index, which ranks countries on how complicit they are in helping individuals to hide their finances from the rule of law.
The holy grail for tax administrations is arguably achieving a positive
