A group of 183 organisations from
42 countries has issued a plea to world leaders to impose a tax on financial
transactions to help meet the costs of the economic crisis.
Members include Britain’s Robin
Hood Tax campaign, supported by the TUC, Friends of the Earth and ActionAid.
Their plea comes ahead of the
summit of leaders of G20 economic powers in the South Korean capital Seoul on
11-12 November.
The issue of measures needed to
stabilise the world economy and boost the global recovery are set to be
discussed.
The plea comes in a letter
addressed to G20 leaders including Prime Minister David Cameron and US
President Barack Obama.
It is signed by development,
health, education and environmental charities and unions from 16 of the G20
countries.
They argue that a financial tax
would help meet the costs “of the global financial and economic crisis,
including reducing the unacceptably high rate of job loss, and achieve key
development, health, education and climate change objectives in developing
countries”.
TUC general secretary Brendan
Barber said: “Governments around the world are embarking on a sweeping
programme of austerity measures that will lead to huge job losses and cuts in
services that the most vulnerable in society rely upon.
“At the same time the banks
are back to business as usual with multi-million pound salaries being paid to
the chief executives of bailed-out banks and billions handed out in bonuses.”
He added: “A Robin Hood Tax
would mean the world’s banks paying to reduce deficits they helped cause and
would remove the need for such swingeing cuts in public spending.”
ActionAid said the tax would raise
billions of pounds for the world’s poorest hit by the global downturn
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