Brussels, 28/06/2001 (Agence Europe) - The EP Intergroup "capital taxation, taxation, globalisation" chaired by the French Socialist Harlem Desir and whose Secretary General is the British Labour member Glyn Ford welcomed the announcement during his hearing on 27 June on the Tobin tax, of the Belgian Presidency of the EU Council's intention to discuss the Tobin tax during the informal Ecofin Council in liege, next 22 and 23 September. We need concrete undertakings in order for such a tax to generate sufficient revenues to push back the great poverty of 1.2 billion people living on less than one dollar per day, said Mr Desir. Mr Ford felt that there are no longer any intellectual and technical arguments against a tax allowing to curb currency speculation.
During the hearing, Professor Paul Bernd Spahn (Geothe University, Frankfurt), presented a draft tax with two levels: - one of the Tobin kind, with a very low rate (0.02%), which would earn around USD 60 billion per year (more than the present State aid to development); - the other, a very high rate, to be enforced when a currency brutally leaves a determined level of fluctuation.