Maya Forstater

why do tax justice campaigners see publishing tax policy as a win? Isn't that privileging processes not outcomes (ie. tax paid)?

I think that's the core challenge w this. Everyone thinks they know avoidance. But its hard to define (see AMT/ Cafe Nero discussion) Zero tax could be a fair outcome (if making a fair loss). So focus has been on transparency metrics- but that just kicks the can down the road.

The big ask of the FTM is voluntary country-by-country reporting -- which is easy to comply with if you only operate in 1 or 2 countries. So in practice (I think) only one UK firm w international operations (LUSH) has done it so far.

FTM have not yet developed a template for foreign owned companies. But underlying assumptions are that transparency provides anyone with enough data they can use to judge if company is paying a fair amount of tax.

Which clearly isn’t the case for AMT Coffee. The transparency seems to come down to “trust us”.

i'm really sceptical of private initiatives & voluntary codes of conduct for businesses. i've never seen this improve outcomes - for labour, environment (& perhaps tax too?) isn't this a distraction from need for effective government legislation & international cooperation?

This is I think the only such initiative on tax. I don’t have much knowledge of similar initiatives in other areas - is it something that’s been studied?

YEAH! enough literature to fill a castle! the forest stewardship council is pretty similar: http://www.fsc-uk.org/en-uk  lots of parallel initiatives in global supply chains.