Financial Transparency Coalition

The reason why places like Jersey became tax havens was to raise tax revenue from third parties. The tax revenues raised were, in effect, export earnings that kept their economies afloat.

A couple of days ago I highlighted a report from Cayman about a meeting of offshore lawyers where it seemed there was widespread agreement that the system of tax information exchange agreements that the OECD, UK government and tax haven authorities say delivers secrecy in the murky world of secrecy jurisdictions really does not such thing.

Cayman News Service has blown the lid on one of the biggest lies of recent years about tax havens / secrecy jurisdiction. It’s been claimed since 2009 that tax information exchange agreements – promoted by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development as the way to tackle tax haven abuse – mean that tax havens are now ‘open and transparent places’.

There have been more responses to Action Aid’s report on the use of tax havens by FTSE 100 companies.