One of the conference panel discussions in progress. From right: Cora O’Brien (Director of Policy at Irish Tax Institute), Ricardo Barrientos (Senior Economist at Central American Institute of Fiscal Studies, former Deputy Finance Minister, Guatemala), Professor Donncha O’Connel (Head of School of Law at NUI Galway), and Sheila Killian (Assistant Dean, Kemmy Business School, University of Limerick).
'ensure that there are rules developed, so that tax policy does not undermine social policy.' Also speaking at the conference, Lidy Nacpil, Coordinator of Tax Justice Asia emphasised the need for campaigning on tax justice.
Keynote speaker, Professor Philip Alston, UN Special Rapporteur on Extreme Poverty and Human Rights, addressing the conference.
The keynote speaker, Professor Philip Alston, the UN Special Rapporteur on Extreme Poverty and Human Rights, said;
She said; 'It’s very important that we campaign on issues that empower people rather than cultivate a situation where there is an apparent dependence on external help. I say ‘apparent’ because if the situation was different then I believe that we would have the capacity to generate the resources that we need for our own development.' Simon Harris TD, Minister of State for Finance, noted on the day that this conference simply would not have been able to happen three years ago, but the work of Christian Aid has brought the tax justice debate to the fore.
Professor Alston challenged the Irish government over some of its tax arrangements, which he said were 'not appropriately considered to be simply low tax policies, but are in fact policies that the Irish government knows well, facilitate the effective laundering of money by major multinational corporations with all too few benefits for Ireland and big detrimental consequences for developing countries and others.' Professor Alston also said that Ireland should be more 'actively and proactively' involved in the international debate on tax policy as it was in Ireland’s interests to
Grabbing a cup of coffee at the tax and human rights conference. (L-R) Rosamond Bennett (Christian Aid), Professor Philip Alstron (UN Rapporteur), Sorley McCaughey (Christian Aid) and Simon Harris TD (Minister of State at the Departments of Finance. Christian Aid Ireland
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Photos by Maxwell Photography
'Tax and human rights are integrally related. In fact tax policy is human rights policy, where you decide to allocate your resources whether you collect resources and from whom makes all the difference in the human rights arena.'