View previous stories
	The human rights impact of fiscal and tax policy by Magdalena Sepúlveda Carmona UN Human Rights Office   Fiscal and tax policy (2014)   The United Nations Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights, Magdalena Sepúlveda Carmona, submitted a report concerning the human rights impact of fiscal and tax policy for the 26th session of the United Nations Human Rights Council (June 2014).   Fiscal and tax policies (revenue-raising and expenditure) are an essential tool for States to meet their human rights commitments and combat poverty. As stipulated by the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (art. 2), States must make use of their maximum available resources to realize economic, social and cultural rights. Low levels of domestic taxation revenue, in particular, can be a major obstacle to a State’s ability to meet these obligations.   A human rights-based assessment of fiscal policy is particularly necessary due to the ongoing repercussions of the global financial and economic crises and their impact on the enjoyment of human rights worldwide. The impacts of revenue shortfalls and increased public debt are primarily felt by the poorest and most vulnerable both domestically and abroad, through cuts to budgets for social protection and public services, and a reduction in aid budgets. In many States, efforts to respond to the crisis have not been made in line with international human rights obligations.   The report applies human rights principles and standards to different practices for revenue-raising and taxation, with the objective of: 1) identifying current trends in fiscal and tax policy and their impact on human rights, especially those of persons living in poverty; 2) highlighting concerns raised by particular policies in taxation and spending, as well as good practices; 3) making concrete recommendations to States on how to ensure fiscal and tax policy is in accordance with human rights obligations.   The report considers issues such as tax revenue and distribution, taxation of corporations and the financial sector, intergovernmental tax cooperation, tax evasion and illicit financial flows, and distribution of public expenditure.   The Special Rapporteur invited States, United Nations departments and agencies, national human rights institutions, civil society organizations, individuals living in poverty and social exclusion and other relevant stakeholders to send contributions to the report in the form of research studies, reports and examples of relevant policies.   http://www.ohchr.org/EN/Issues/Poverty/Pages/Fiscalandtaxpolicy2014.aspx http://www.ohchr.org/EN/Issues/Poverty/Pages/AnnualReports.aspx Visit the related web page
	Drafting an international treaty to address rights abuses by multinational corporations by Treaty Movement, Amnesty, Fidh, ICJ, agencies   27 June, 2014   The International Commission of Jurists (ICJ) welcomes the significant steps forward taken by the UN Human Rights Council aimed to develop and strengthen the protection of people from corporate human rights abuses around the world.   In separate resolutions, the Human Rights Council decided to launch a process to elaborate a treaty on business and human rights and also to act to strengthen the means of implementation by both States and businesses of the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights.   While appreciative of these developments, the ICJ emphasized the need to bridge divisions that appear to have deepened among States and to work to ensure that a future treaty will cover all major businesses enterprises, not only those with a transnational element.   On Thursday, the Council adopted a resolution establishing an Intergovernmental Working Group to start a process of drafting treaty in the field of business and human rights.   The ICJ and many other human rights proponents have long affirmed the need for a new legally binding instrument to ensure legal accountability of business enterprises and access to justice for victims of human rights abuses involving businesses.   The ICJ also considers that a treaty will set common global standards backed by legal obligations for States to use the force of the rule of law to ensure human rights compliant corporate conduct.   Today, Friday, the Council adopted a second resolution, this time strengthening the implementation of the existing Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights.   The new resolution promotes National Action Plans, a UN Fund for capacity building and stresses the need to focus on access to justice for victims of business corporations’ abuses.   The ICJ considers the two resolutions to be complementary.   It will work towards the development of an effective treaty as well continuing to support the process of implementation of the non-legally-binding Guiding Principles.   “The two resolutions are important steps ahead”, said Carlos Lopez, Senior Legal Adviser leading the Business and Human Rights Programme at the ICJ. “The elaboration of a new treaty should be seized upon by all States as an opportunity to fill the serious gaps in accountability and access to remedies for victims of human rights abuses involving businesses.”   A number of such gaps were identified in an ICJ report released early this month.   Amidst a charged political atmosphere at the Council, the decision to initiate the treaty-making process was taken by a vote rather than by consensus, with 20 voting in favour, 14 against, and 13 abstaining.   The ICJ regrets that negotiations among States failed to reach consensus or wider agreement and that the result was a highly divisive vote.   It will be crucial for all States and civil society members who want to see an effective treaty serve the promotion and protection of human rights to adopt a rigorously constructive approach and to make every possible effort to reach out to those States who have indicated they do not support the process that has been initiated, the ICJ says.   The ICJ is concerned that the resolution to establish the treaty process includes language that seeks an exclusive focus on transnational business in any future treaty.   The ICJ will continue to work for a treaty that covers all major businesses, national or international.   Victims’ access to justice should not depend on whether or not a business happens to cross national boundaries, the organization adds.   http://www.icj.org/business-and-human-rights-icj-welcomes-steps-towards-a-new-treaty-and-to-strengthen-implementation-of-existing-standards/ http://www.icj.org/theme/international-economic-relations/ http://www.icj.org/theme/economic-social-and-cultural-rights/ http://www.fidh.org/en/globalisation-human-rights/business-and-human-rights/15658-significant-vote-at-the-un-human-rights-council-ray-of-hope-to-address http://www.hrw.org/news/2014/07/01/dispatches-treaty-end-corporate-abuses http://www.escr-net.org/node/365557 http://www.srfood.org/images/stories/pdf/otherdocuments/20140311_Ecuador.pdf http://www.ihrb.org/commentary/business-and-human-rights-treaty-we-shouldnt-be-afraid.html http://www.ihrb.org/commentary/quo-vadis-unsolicited-advice-business.html   Treaty Alliance Press Release:   Yesterday, a resolution was adopted in the UN Human Rights Council that will begin the process of elaborating an international legally binding instrument on business and human rights. Despite strong opposition from the EU and US, the resolution received affirmative votes from 20 member States on the Human Rights Council, while 13 States abstained.   This victory in the promotion of human rights is welcomed by the Treaty Alliance, a group of networks and campaign organizations collectively working to organize advocacy in support of developing binding international regulation to address corporate human rights abuses. A statement calling for an international legally binding instrument has been signed by 610 civil society organizations and social movements and 400 individuals from 95 countries. Additionally, the Subcommittee on Human Rights of the European Parliament and the Vatican have made statements supporting the creation of such an instrument.   This adoption will result in the establishment of an open-ended intergovernmental working group that will have the mandate of elaborating a binding instrument to regulate the activities of Transnational Corporations (TNCs) and Other Business Enterprises. Some States opposing the resolution made attempts to come to a compromise, but were not willing to provide a concrete path towards the drafting of a binding instrument to prevent human rights abuses by TNCs and other business enterprises and allow for the provision of remedy to victims.   While companies have a responsibility to respect all human rights, as reaffirmed in the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights, they are currently not held legally accountable. Thus, the implementation of the Guiding Principles at the national level has been slow and the Guiding Principles remain insufficient to prevent human rights violations. In the meantime, many victims around the world continue to suffer without access to justice.   Members of the Treaty Alliance emphasize that the establishment of a binding instrument is complementary to the implementation of the Guiding Principles and necessary to ensure glaring gaps in protection are addressed. Notably, an intergovernmental process will also contribute to addressing current imbalances under international law, particularly in light of protections companies can obtain under Bilateral Investment Treaties and Free Trade Agreements, which have allowed corporations to sue States.   While the US and EU have repeatedly stated that they will not participate in the intergovernmental open-ended working group established by the resolution, the Treaty Alliance hopes for their involvement in this process that will be critical to ensuring effective protection of human rights in the context of business activities.   May 2014 (IPS)   The U.N. Human Rights Council (HRC) is being urged to back a resolution next month to draw up a binding accord that would ensure both accountability and mechanisms for redress by victims of corporate rights abuse.   Some 500 global groups are calling for action by governments next month to jumpstart the process of drafting an international treaty to address rights abuses by multinational corporations, following on a related proposal by Ecuador and others.   On Wednesday, a global network of civil society groups known as the Treaty Alliance called on members of the U.N. Human Rights Council (HRC) to back a resolution next month to draw up a binding accord that would ensure both accountability and mechanisms for redress by victims of corporate rights abuse. The council will hold its 26th session Jun. 9-27 in Geneva.   The Treaty Alliance’s joint statement, signed by more than 150 organisations and representing hundreds more, underscores “the need to enhance the international legal framework, including international remedies, applicable to State action to protect rights in the context of business operations, and mindful of the urgent need to ensure access to justice and remedy and reparations for victims of corporate human rights abuse.”   The statement also calls on member states to work towards a binding agreement that “affirms the applicability of human rights obligations to the operations of transnational corporations and other business enterprises” and requires states to “provide for legal liability for business enterprises for acts or omissions that infringe human rights”.   The alliance is urging the creation of a supra-national body to oversee any eventual treaty’s implementation.   “A system of binding rules to hold corporations legally liable for violations of human rights is an idea whose time has come,” David Pred, the managing director of Inclusive Development International, a watchdog group and member of the Treaty Alliance, told IPS.   “Transnational corporations have been literally getting away with murder for far too long, but rather than reining them in, our governments are ceding big businesses ever more power through free trade agreements and investment treaties. We have joined this call because we believe there is no greater threat to human rights and democracy in the world today than unchecked corporate power.”   For decades calls have been made for a strengthened international framework on corporate rights obligations and their redress. This movement has been partly successful, culminating in the 2011 endorsement by the U.N. HRC of what are known as the Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights.   While seen as a step forward, the Guiding Principles were hobbled from the beginning in that they are voluntary.   “Ultimately there are no means to ensure enforcement of the Guiding Principles, and what we’ve seen since 2011 is that the implementation of the Guiding Principles has not worked as a barrier to human rights violations by trans-national corporations,” Gonzalo Berron, an associate fellow at the Transnational Institute and a Treaty Alliance organiser, told IPS.   “We’re not saying that we don’t want the Guiding Principles to be applied and promoted – this is a parallel process, but we think that the sooner we start discussing a binding code the better. And now we have an opportunity to move forward with that.”   Indeed, advocates of a binding treaty say the current environment, in the lead-up to the HRC’s June session, is uniquely conducive.   “Before we’ve generally seen mobilisation among affected communities and specific NGOs, but for the first time you’re now seeing this huge alliance of different campaigns – this is something new at the international level,” Berron says.   This momentum can be traced to last September. At that time, during the HRC’s 24th session, a group of 85 countries put out a joint statement noting that the Guiding Principles are “only a partial answer” and emphasising “the necessity of moving forward towards a legally binding framework to regulate the work of transnational corporations”.   Supporters note that the letter constitutes the first time in decades that the issue has been initiated directly by U.N. member states.   “This more recent momentum stems from the will of the representatives of many countries in many regions, not by U.N. entities, which has greater democratic meaning and significance inside and outside the United Nations,” Dominic Renfrey, a programme officer with the International Network for Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, told IPS.   Member states sit on the HRC for three-year stints. Renfrey notes that the current composition of the 47-member council could be an advantage for supporters of a treaty push.   “At this moment a number of members of the Human Rights Council are states that understand better than most what the impact on their people is from poorly regulated development,” he says. “As such these states stand to benefit from an international system that better protects the human rights of their people, while ensuring a more sustainable and respectful form of investment.”   Still, the idea of a treaty isn’t being embraced by all parties, including supporters of strengthened corporate rights obligations and mechanisms for accountability and redress.   “While we are closely following these developments, we remain focused on the critical gaps that exist in ensuring that governments live up to their duty to protect human rights,” Amol Mehra, director of the International Corporate Accountability Roundtable, a global coalition, told IPS.   “Such gaps can be meaningfully addressed through regulation of corporations to prevent potential human rights violations both at home and abroad, and through strong remedial measures, including legal avenues of accountability, when harms do occur.”   John Ruggie, the U.N.’s special rapporteur on business and human rights, has suggested the problem is that the issues involved in corporate rights obligations are too vast for a single treaty.   Ruggie wrote last week, there are some 80,000 multinational corporations in existence and millions of subsidiaries, and official reporting on these companies adherence to the treaty may well be beyond the capacity of many governments. Such concerns would be echoed for any supra-national body created to offer related oversight, he suggested.   The fundamental problems of enforcement would be exacerbated by governments’ hesitancy to prosecute for abuses committed outside of their territories – a significant problem given that treaties are consensus documents.   “To add value any new treaty enforcement provision would have to involve extraterritorial jurisdiction,” Ruggie says. “Some UN human rights treaty bodies have urged the home states of multinationals to provide greater extraterritorial protection against corporate-related human rights abuses.”   * Behind the lack of remedy for corporations human rights abuses - Audrey Gaughran, Director of Global Issues at Amnesty International: http://www.rightingfinance.org/?p=791   http://www.ohchr.org/EN/Issues/Business/Pages/BusinessIndex.aspx http://www.business-humanrights.org/Home http://www.ohchr.org/EN/Issues/Business/Forum/Pages/2013ForumonBusinessandHumanRights.aspx http://www.business-humanrights.org/SpecialRepPortal/Home http://www.fidh.org/en/globalization-esc-rights/joint-ngo-statement-to-the-human-rights-council-in-support-of-the http://www.icj.org/on-video-access-to-justice-and-corporate-complicity-in-human-rights-abuses/   Joint Statement: Call for an international legally binding instrument on human rights, transnational corporations and other business enterprises.   This statement has been endorsed by a wide alliance of international networks, organizations and social movements. It represents the collective expression of a growing mobilization of global civil society calling for further enhancement of international legal standards to address corporate infringements of human rights.   It welcomes the recent initiatives by States in the United Nations Human Rights Council, presented by Ecuador in the session of September 2013, to develop an international treaty on legally binding rules for TNCs on human rights issues.   We, the undersigned organisations,   Concerned about the continuing abuses and violations of human rights occurring all over the world which directly or indirectly engage the responsibility of business enterprises;   Concerned also that such abusive conduct often disproportionately impacts women, who comprise the majority of workers in the most vulnerable sectors, peasants, indigenous peoples, persons living in poverty, children among others, and especially concerned by the fact that justice is denied to those who suffer harm,   Considering the invaluable work done by human rights defenders and organisations, trade unions, indigenous rights and women rights defenders and others defending and protecting human rights in the face of corporate- related abuses,   Concerned at the incidence of attacks, harassment, restrictions, intimidation and reprisals against these human rights defenders,   Considering the initiatives taken by some States within and outside the United Nations human rights bodies as well as the action and work undertaken by human rights experts and bodies of the United Nations to provide better protection of human rights in the context of business operations,   Recalling existing States’ obligations under global and regional human rights treaties and the need to implement and complement those treaties to make them effective in the context of business transnational operations,   Convinced of the need to enhance the international legal framework, including international remedies, applicable to State action to protect rights in the context of business operations, and mindful of the urgent need to ensure access to justice and remedy and reparations for victims of corporate human rights abuse,   1. Call upon the States to elaborate an international treaty that:   • Affirms the applicability of human rights obligations to the operations of transnational corporations and other business enterprises;   • Requires States Parties to monitor and regulate the operations of business enterprises under their jurisdiction, including when acting outside their national territory, with a view to prevent the occurrence of abuses of human rights in the course of those operations;   • Requires States Parties to provide for legal liability for business enterprises for acts or omissions that infringe human rights;   • Requires States Parties to provide for access to an effective remedy by any State concerned, including access to justice for foreign victims that suffered harm from acts or omissions of a business enterprise in situations where there are bases for the States involved to exercise their territorial or extraterritorial protect- obligations;   • Provides for an international monitoring and accountability mechanism;   • Provides for protection of victims, whistle-blowers and human rights defenders that seek to prevent, expose or ensure accountability in cases of corporate abuse and guarantees their right to access to information relevant in this context.   2. Call on the United Nations Human Rights Council to take step towards the elaboration of this treaty, and to that end establish an open ended inter-governmental working group tasked with a drafting mandate.   3. Call on civil society organisations to take measures towards the establishment of a joint initiative to achieve the objective of a legally binding instrument within the United Nations without delay.   http://www.treatymovement.com/statement/ http://www.treatymovement.com/blog http://www.escrnetpeoplesforum.org/forumwatch-blog/2013/12/5/bhopal-disaster-never-again http://www.escrnetpeoplesforum.org/joint-statement-binding-international-instrument http://www.ishr.ch/news/corporate-accountability http://www.hrbcountryguide.org http://www.escr-net.org/ http://www.forum-asia.org/ http://www.ihrb.org/top10/business_human_rights_issues/2014.html http://www.ituc-csi.org/new-ituc-global-rights-index-the http://www.icrc.org/eng/resources/international-review/review-887-business-violence-conflict/index.jsp Visit the related web page
	View more stories