Alliance highlights a big day for a tiny tax on 22 June
Tuesday 21 June 2011, 8:37AM
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Wednesday 22 June 2011 has been declared a "big day for a tiny tax", highlighting the need for a worldwide financial transactions tax to curb financial speculation and provide the necessary funds to eradicate poverty and protect the environment.
Alliance Party co-leader Kay Murray says that the Alliance Party is advocating a small financial transactions tax.
She says this is a better tax than GST, which exempts financial services and unfairly targets low income earners.
"A financial transactions tax is even more urgent now that GST has risen to 15%."
The Alliance was one of the founders of the nationwide Tax Justice Campaign (www.nogstonfood.org) that is urging the Government to remove GST from food and replace it with a small financial transactions tax.
The Tax Justice petition has collected around 40 000 signatures.
A financial transaction tax is now considered a realistic proposition by the IMF, the European Commission, the G20 and a number of national governments, according to Oxfam UK.
The goal of World Financial Transaction Day is to influence decision makers ahead of the G20 in November. EU Finance ministers met on 15 June and European Council will be meeting 23-24 June.
The Alliance Party would be delighted to see a worldwide financial tax on the agenda at the G20 summit, says Ms Murray.
"But we would like to see New Zealand take the lead and implement our own version of a financial tax as soon as possible and use the income to remove GST from food."
World Financial Transaction Day