Later this week in Paris the OECD will hold a meeting of the 'Task Force Working Group on Harmful Tax Practices' set up after its January Barbados meeting saw the beginnings of organised resistance from the offshore jurisdictions it has blacklisted for 'unfair tax competition'. The 13-member Task Force includes representatives of the OECD itself, the offshore jurisdictions, and the Commonwealth Secretariat, and is charged with the task of creating a framework within which the OECD's 'harmful tax competition' agenda could be discussed in a less threatening way.
At its previous meeting in London, the Task Force made little progress, as the OECD continued to push the jurisdictions to commit to its Memorandum of Agreement, while the jurisdictions demanded the creation of a global tax forum in which key issues could be discussed multilaterally.
Since then, it has begun to seem that the US Treasury Department may no longer be wholeheartedly behind the OECD's initiative. Encouraged by this, the Caribbean offshore jurisdictions in particular will continue to work for the creation of a multilateral forum.
"We are seeking a global tax forum to resolve these issues, rather than one dominated by the OECD," said Sir Ronald Sanders, Antigua's chief foreign affairs representative, and a member of the Task Force. "The OECD members are not now united on an OECD position, and many of them would welcome a reopening of the issue."
"We are surprised and very encouraged by the prospect of the US breaking ranks on this issue with its OECD partners," said a Barbadian official.
The OECD denied that there had been any change in the US position. Said a spokesperson: "It is natural that a new administration would examine existing policies, and that is what is happening. We maintain that these issues must be discussed only by us and the offending jurisdictions and not in a wider forum."
US pressure group The Center for Freedom and Prosperity, which was present on the sidelines of the Barbados and London meetings, and has been encouraging the offshore jurisdictions to defy the OECD's tactics, is taking a delegation to Paris, the OECD's headquarters city, and will be hosting a public forum on the issue, with special focus on territorial taxation, financial privacy, and fiscal sovereignty.
The forum, which is open to the press and the general public, will take place Wednesday, February 28, at 4:00, at the Offices of IES, a French think-tank, located at 35 Avenue Mac-Mahon, 75017 Paris, France (Tel: 011 33 1 43 80 85 17)
In a setback for the forces arrayed against the OECD, the organisation announced on Monday that the Seychelles, which had been one of the more energetic opponents of the blacklist, had become the eighth country to sign a 'commitment' letter, which means its removal from the list, and the threat of sanctions.
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