Local councillors are to debate the introduction of a Financial Transaction Tax at a meeting tomorrow (13th November) as part of a plan to restore funding for local services.
Cllr Robin Moss (Deputy Leader of B&NES Labour Group) said: “The financial crisis, resulting from the reckless behaviour of bankers, has cost us all dear.
“The introduction of a Financial Transaction Tax could raise as much as £20 billion of additional revenue each year, from a tax of just 0.05% on transactions carried out by financial institutions.
“The tax would not apply to ordinary individuals.
“It is only right that banks now pay their fair share to repair the damage they have done.
“When local councils have been asked to bear cuts of more than 40% which have inevitably hit local services it does not seem unreasonable to ask the banks to pay a tax of 0.05%.
“Proceeds of a Financial Transaction Tax should be passed to local councils as a way of reversing the devastating cuts to local government funding since 2010.
“In B&NES, I would expect the cash raised through a Financial Transaction Tax to be used to reverse the cuts such as those to Children’s Centre services and public toilets”.
1 Comment
ftf123
Wednesday 12th November, 2014 at 14:00“The tax would not apply to ordinary individuals.”
Oh, really? Financial Transaction Tax is not a tax on banks. It’s a tax on investments that will reduce our personal pensions and will result in negative revenue. Businesses do not pay sales tax, customers pay it. FTT creates negative revenue by reducing GDP.
“The DCB study showed that 1.7 billion euros, over 42% of the annual FTT cost in the Netherlands, would be borne by pensions.”
The IMF’s FTT Final Report For The G-20, June 2010, “Its real burden may fall largely on final consumers (the final investor) rather than, as often seems to be supposed, earnings in the financial sector.”
Consultancy firm London Economics, “FTT cost to household savings could reach over €300 billion.”
City of London Economic Research reporting on the household savings losses, “Spain 16 percent household savings loss, Germany 14.1 percent household savings loss, Italy 12.3 percent household savings loss.”
Net Negative Revenue: UK Parliament Economic Sub-Committee of the House of Lords, “The FTT is likely to induce a loss in GDP between five and 20 times larger than the revenues raised from the tax.”
UK Parliament European Scrutiny Committee citing the EU Commission’s FTT Impact Assessment, before including negative relocation effects, “a 3.43% fall in EU GDP equates to a fall in economic output worth €421 (£362) billion and a 0.34% fall in employment equates to a loss of 812,000 jobs.”