by Vaughan Gunson
Tax Justice campaign coordinator
vaughangunson@taxjustice.net
021-0415 082

There are two demands on the Tax Justice petition. One is to remove GST from food and give immediate relief at the supermarket to grassroots people. If we can win GST off food – an idea supported by a majority of New Zealanders – then we may be able to build the political momentum needed to get rid of GST all together. GST is a horrible regressive tax that hurts low and middle income people the most.

The second demand on the petition is to tax financial speculation. While we pay tax on our kai, filthy rich speculators pay zero tax on their wheeling and dealing. This is a gross injustice.

But the speculators aren’t just getting away with paying no tax, their activity on a global scale has contributed to the world financial crisis which is causing untold economic hardship for grassroots people worldwide.

And, it’s speculators who are responsible for driving up food prices through their speculative investment in food commodity markets. This is resulting in millions and millions of people around the world going hungry. It’s a crime against humanity.

The speculators, who profit at the expense of the rest of us, need to be chopped down. That’s the message of the latest Tax Justice cartoon.

The Tax Justice petition will be presented to Parliament in a few weeks time on Tuesday 16 August. The more signatures we have the stronger the message we’ll be giving to politicians and the media. We hope to reach 50,000 signatures.

Every effort to collect more signatures in these last weeks will help. Contact us now. Or download the petition here.

Post completed petition sheets to: Tax Justice, PO Box 13-685, Auckland 1061.

To sign the online version of the petition go to http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/taxjustice/

by Deborah Doane
from NewStatesman
11 January 2011

While inertia continues to define the coalition government’s approach to banking regulation, the bankers are happily enjoying yet another free-for-all spending splurge – and fears are emerging of a new bubble. This time, it’s a commodity bubble, similar to the one that led to food riots around the world in 2007 and 2008.

In case you hadn’t noticed, food prices are at an all-time high: the latest figures show food price inflation at 5.5 per cent, outpacing the overall inflation figure of 3.3 per cent. You’ll be paying as much as 25 per cent more for your regular cuppa as tea prices rise; and we already saw the cost of our Christmas turkey go up by more than £3 before Christmas, due to the doubling in feed costs in 2010.
Read the rest of this entry »

Perfect storm of climate and oil puts world into ‘danger territory’

by Sean O’Grady, Economics Editor
from The Independent
6 January 2011

Food riots, geopolitical tensions, global inflation and increasing hunger among the planet’s poorest people are the likely effects of a new surge in world food prices, which have hit an all-time high according to the United Nations.

The UN’s index of food prices – an international basket comprising wheat, corn, dairy produce, meat and sugar – stands at its highest since the index started in 1990, surpassing even the peaks seen during the 2008 food crisis, which prompted civil disturbances from Mexico to Indonesia.

“We are entering danger territory,” said the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation’s chief economist, Abdolreza Abbassian.

Global food prices have risen for the sixth month in succession. Wheat has almost doubled since June, sugar is at a 30-year high, and pork is up by a quarter since the beginning of 2010.

Read the rest of this entry »

Tax Justice media release
17 December 2010

“Stealing food is nowhere near as bad as what banks and speculators are getting away with,” says Vaughan Gunson, Tax Justice campaign coordinator.

“A recent article in my local Whangarei paper referred to people stealing food. This is a crime, so if you’re caught you get locked away.” (See Market fights hunger, Whangarei Leader, 7 Dec)

“Yet the far greater crime is going unpunished,” says Gunson. “Big global banks are fostering an orgy of speculation in world food prices.” (See Bank and Hedge Fund Speculation Causes Food Prices to Soar by Third World Resurgence, 22 Nov).

In 2007-2008, banks and other speculators fled mortgage markets and invested in basic food commodities, driving up prices that flowed through to New Zealanders paying more at the supermarket.

Mr Gunson says the speculators are at it again in 2010. Wheat prices jumped 60% in July because of a rush of speculative investment financed by the banks.

“While a global elite profit from food price speculation, grassroots people around the world are either going hungry or missing out on eating quality food. A massive crime against humanity is being perpetuated by the speculators,” says Gunson.

Statistics NZ recently released figures that show food prices went up 4.8 percent over the last year. While this is bad enough, analysts are predicting worse to come in 2011 as high food prices in commodity markets filter through to the checkout.

The Tax Justice campaign has a two pronged answer to rising food prices: remove GST from food and tax the speculators instead.

“It’s obscene that the government insists on maintaining this horrible tax on food when people are struggling to buy the food they need,” says Gunson.

“And New Zealand must join the global crusade against financial speculation. Introducing a tax on speculative money flows would go along way towards discouraging an economic activity that’s causing so much pain for grassroots people.”

This weekend Tax Justice campaigners are hitting the streets around the country as part of a pre-Xmas signature drive. The aim is to reach 30,000 signatures for the Tax Justice petition by the end of the year.

New Zealanders can sign the Tax Justice petition online at http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/taxjustice/

For more information and comment, contact:

Vaughan Gunson
Tax Justice campaign coordinator
(09)433 8897
021-0415 082
svpl@xtra.co.nz

by Vaughan Gunson
Tax Justice campaign coordinator
from CAFCA’s “Foreign Control Watchdog”, August 2010

The figures are mind blowing. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) estimates that the financial crisis cost the world $US11.9 trillion. The human cost is immeasurable. And it ain’t over. The international bailouts of banks and other financial institutions have seen trillions of dollars of private debt off-loaded onto governments. The financial crisis has not been fixed. The problem has just been shifted. The bailouts have created a “sovereign debt crisis”, which is breaking first in Europe. Governments worldwide are scrambling to get debt under control. The “fiscal stimulus” that accompanied the wave of banking bailouts has now passed over to “austerity measures”, which means cuts to public services and higher taxes for grassroots people. Those who had no part, no say, and no responsibility for the financial crisis are being made the victims, many times over.

The leaders of a club of rich countries called the G20 (Group of 20) recently met in Toronto, Canada. The strategy of making us pay for the crisis was clear. G20 leaders issued a joint statement on 27/6/10 committing member countries to halving their budget deficits by 2013 1. As Toronto resident and anti-capitalist campaigner Naomi Klein wrote: “Faced with the effects of a crisis created by the world’s wealthiest and most privileged strata, they decided to stick the poorest and most vulnerable people in their countries with the bill” 2. This is what the world’s elite are trying to get away with, if we let them. Read the rest of this entry »