With the leaked Panama Papers shining a highlight on the use offshore accounts to cover investments by of some the world’s strongest folks, the International Transport Workers’ Federation is utilizing the publicity to name out international flags of comfort as a chief instance of the type of tax avoidance exercise that appears to fly underneath the radar with tacit approval. 

The Panama Papers, containing some 11.5 million paperwork leaked from the Panamanian legislation agency Mossack Fonseca, have uncovered an intricate internet of offshore accounts utilized by a few of the world’s most distinguished politicians, enterprise leaders and celebrities to hide their wealth and keep away from paying taxes.

“Money laundering, terrorist financing and tax evasion are all clearly unacceptable practices and at odds with the global union movement’s social and economic justice agenda that we at the ITF promote through our work with transport unions around the globe. Equally of concern to us is large-scale corporate tax avoidance that directly impacts on public investment and essential services,” commented ITF General secretary Stephen Cotton in a press release launched by the ITF on Thursday. 

“Much of this activity has been allowed to go on in plain sight with minimal steps being taken to hold companies or individuals to account. It is right that the sheer volume of the crisis and the impact of these widespread financial abuses have been put into the public arena. It is time to take the kind of definitive action the ITF has been involved in for years to stem this corporate greed,” Cotton added.

In explicit, Cotton singled out the flags of comfort for example of the very type of abusive tax avoidance actions that appear to fly underneath the radar. 

“Take our flags of convenience (FOC) campaign launched in 1948,” the assertion stated.

“Registering a ship underneath a FOC, the place a vessel is owned in a single nation and flagged in one other, can be a system of tax avoidance. As an FOC flag – the biggest on this planet – Panama is basically a tax haven like most of the UK territories which have been talked about in these papers. And who pays the value? Seafarers, who’re topic to poor circumstances and decrease wages as a result of they’re on the mercy of a system that enables for minimal regulation and the acquisition of low-cost labour.

“The ITF believes there must be a ‘genuine link’ between the true proprietor of a vessel and the flag the vessel flies, in accordance with the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS). FOC registries make it harder for unions, business stakeholders and the general public to carry ship homeowners to account.

“In many circumstances, the registries themselves usually are not even run from the nation of the flag. Some FOC transport registers are franchised out to international corporations and are additionally company registers. The Liberian Registry, the second largest on this planet, is run by the Liberian International Ship and Corporate Registry (LISCR), a completely US owned and operated firm.

“The ITF’s campaign, compelling owners of FOC flagged vessels to sign agreements which guarantee certain terms and working conditions for crew and policing these through a network of inspectors, is the only thing that goes some way to redress the balance of the FOC tax avoidance scheme, and to recognize the human cost it has.”

Expanding on the ITF’s frustrations, ITF president Paddy Crumlin commented: “Let’s look at oil and gas multinational Chevron. The ITF produced a report last year highlighting the amount of tax revenue which could be lost in Australia through the company’s complex profit shifting and tax avoidance schemes. The amount is shocking. What the revelations in the Panama Papers have brought to the public’s attention is that this kind of activity, which directly disadvantages ordinary hard working people, is happening all over the world while governments sit back and fail to take responsibility for the loopholes that allow it to continue.”

He went on: “If Chevron and other multinationals paid the tax they should be paying, austerity wouldn’t be an issue. We wouldn’t be seeing cuts in funding for education, public transport, healthcare.”

“The kinds of deliberate and extreme incidences of tax avoidance being run from Panama are examples of the way corporate power avoids its obligations to society, communities and workers. We’re pleased that these incidences are now being taken up more widely in a public arena so that they can be properly investigated and we hope to see action taken against those who have disregarded their responsibilities in the name of profit.”