As the leaders of the world’s most powerful and wealthiest nations convene in Northern Ireland, taxes, transparency, and trade will top the agenda.
British Prime Minister David Cameron has made his agenda clear in
a nicely packaged alliteration- the “three T’s” will be the focus
of day one at Belfast Waterfront Hall.
“Making sure we have more trade deals so we keep prices down,
making sure we have greater transparency so we can help
developing countries get the tax and revenue that they need, and
this issue of taxation, making sure we crack down on tax evasion
and aggressive tax avoidance, so right across the world,
countries get the tax revenue they need to keep taxes down for
hard-working people,” Cameron said Monday morning, outlining
his agenda for the day.
Though terrorism and the Syria crisis will undoubtedly arise, but
the UK, the host, is determined to focus on global economic
issues and put into place measures to bring about global economic
recovery.
In an effort to boost growth on both sides of the pond, the
summit will mark the start of trade talks between the EU and US.
European trade ministers have already ironed out the details and
on Friday put forward a free trade agreement, so the negotiations
today should run smoothly.
The talks could lead to deal within 12 to 18 months, and could be
bring an additional $15.7 million (£10bn) to the UK economy, or
on average, $600 (£380) per household, The Guardian
reported after a briefing at the summit.
“This is a real example of where meetings like this make a
genuine difference to families in Britain,” the spokesman
said.
Before all the leaders gather at the summit, David Cameron, US
President Obama, French President Holland, German Chancellor
Merkel, Italian Prime Minister Letta, as well as Presidents of
the European Commission and European Council, will convene to
discuss EU-US trade.
The EU press conference is schedules to begin at 12:00pm local
time.
The world’s top economies are losing steam – the eurozone is
stuck in double-dip recession, Chinese manufacturing data is
weak, the Japanese trade deficit continues to expand, and the US
is only slowly showing signs of economic recovery.
An estimated $8.5 trillion sits in offshore accounts, which
doesn’t draw tax revenue back to the source of the wealth, and
has come under attack from politicians as the economic crisis
deepens.
Companies, most
notably Apple, use creative tax schemes to shelve profits and
avoid taxes, a practice which is currently not a criminal
offense.
Leaders of the G8 will discuss multinational cooperative tactics
to put a halt on tax evaders.
In order to track down the tax evaders, the US and the UK have
called for an open information exchange on the bank accounts of
individuals and multinational companies.
Oxfam, a UK-based charity, estimates that some $18.47 trillion is being held by individuals in tax
havens around the world. Of this some $7.18 trillion is in
accounts situated in British Overseas Territories and Crown
Dependencies.
The same study found that the UK lost out in over $156 billion in
tax revenue from those individuals who dodge mainland taxes by
keeping their assets offshore.
David Cameron can call for commitment to clamp down on tax evasion, but it is clear he will
need to start at home.
The tax evasion topic spills into the transparency theme, which
focuses on developing countries and commodities.
Transparency in the natural resources industry would force
industries to disclose more information about payments, taxes,
and operations in countries where they extract gold, palladium,
diamonds, oil and gas, and other precious metals.
David Cameron will hold his first bilateral meeting with Japanese Prime Minister Abe before the
conference, at 11:30am local time.
At 13:45 Cameron will welcome the leaders into the Lough Erne
conference center, and at 19:00 bilateral meetings with leaders
are scheduled to take place.
Leaders will reconvene on Tuesday.
This article originally appeared on: RT