Make Tax Fair campaign

Corporate tax avoidance - big companies artificially lowering their tax bills - deprives the world’s poorest countries of the money they need to tackle poverty. With campaigning for the General Election in full swing, tax dodging is shaping up to be a key issue. New ActionAid research has revealed that more than 8 in 10 of people in the UK want to see the next UK government clamp down on tax havens and corporate tax avoidance.

In April 2016 the Panama Papers broke open the secret world of tax havens. The leak of 11.5 million files from the law firm Mossack Fonseca gave the world a look into nearly fifty years of the relationship between tax, tax dodging and tropical tax havens. That scandal has been followed by controversy over Apple’s tiny tax bill and a leak of more than a million tax haven files from the Bahamas. UK Prime Minister Theresa May has rightly called for a crackdown on tax dodging. Ahead of the Conservative Party Conference we look at what she can do to deliver on that call. 

Though complicated, taxes are a key building block of society. When tax works, it pays for roads, schools, hospitals and much more. But when they aren't paid there is a real human impact with the world's poorest women and children paying the price for the lack of public services. Read on to hear from people affected by tax dodging, and what we can do to stop this.

From launching the campaign for a fair UK-Malawi tax treaty to some exciting developments from our colleagues campaigning in Zambia and Ireland, it's been a busy few months for our Make Tax Fair campaign. Lots of progress has been made, but there's still a way to go yet. Read on to find out about the great news from Ireland and Zambia and how you can get more involved in our campaign. 

Using our analysis of more than 500 tax treaties, ActionAid's new report, 'Mistreated', shows how these agreements negatively affect a developing country's ability to tax the profits from foreign owned companies who operate within their borders. Along with Italy, the UK has 13 of them! Here we take a look at what the research shows, as well as what this means for countries that are bound by them.

Meet three amazing campaigners from ActionAid’s youth network, Activista, who are working on our Make Tax Fair campaign in Malawi. They’re pretty angry about the UK-Malawi tax treaty, which makes it possible for UK companies to get away with paying little or no tax in their country, and are fighting hard to get it changed.