Nick Shaxson – Treasure Islands

Nick’s talk was horrifyingly blunt; I experienced a terrible dawning – I thought tax havens were a marginal phenomenon, and that they were only available for dodgy rulers from far-flung countries or fat greedy cats whose reason for being is to hang on to their wealth regardless of moral justifications for sharing via the tax system. I was wrong; tax havens are not sunny islands in the English Channel; they are countries like the USA! The British entanglement is incredible, complex and amounts to a Second Empire! They are not only about tax, they offer escape from transparency, regulation, criminal-law and corporate-governance rules. Nick talked us through the history, the state of play and explored the possibility of this being cleared up. The prognosis is not great although thank goodness people like Nick are bringing it to public attention. And if democracy is not too shot to pieces, maybe we can do something about it.

Brighton Dome, Studio Theatre, 12 May 2013

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