Aid

Press Release: May 18, 2010

Robin Hood Tax: Canada misses a chance for Leadership

OTTAWA – The Canadian Government is missing an historic opportunity to offer constructive global leadership by refusing to consider any kind of levy on the global financial sector.

“There are two proposals on the table here,” said Fraser Reilly-King of the Halifax Initiative. “One would save the banks, the other would save the world. At a time when global poverty is rising, along with sea levels, and European economies are crashing, the Harper government is actively campaigning against both.”

A Bank Tax would apply broadly and ensure future bailout funds would come from banks themselves, not the public. Canada’s counterproposal involves “embedded contingent capital,” which would shift the burden to shareholders, turning [contingent] bonds to equity if the banks run into trouble.

Charles Abugre, UN Millennium Campaign, Africa

2010 G8/G20 Canadian Civil Society Coordinating Committee
Parliamentary Roundtables on the G8/G20 Agendas

Roundtable 3: The Millennium Development Goals

Tuesday, April 27th, 2010 9:00 am - 11:00 am Room 2-2, National Press Building, 165 Sparks Street, Ottawa

HI Resource Types: 

Roundtable 3: The Millennium Development Goals - Podcast

2010 G8/G20 Canadian Civil Society Coordinating Committee
Parliamentary Roundtables on the G8/G20 Agendas

Roundtable 3: The Millennium Development Goals

Tuesday, April 27th, 2010
9:00 am - 11:00 am
Room 2-2, National Press Building, 165 Sparks Street, Ottawa

HI Resource Types: 

Event: Climate Change and Poverty at G8/G20 - April 28, 2010

Climate Change and Poverty: Off the Table?

In the wake of the financial crisis, countries around the world have cut back on their commitments to combat climate change and poverty. As the G8/G20 leaders prepare to gather in June, what are the challenges and opportunities for getting these issues back on the table?

Presenters:
Charles Abugre, Director of Campaigns for the Millennium Development Goals, United Nations Development Program
Gauri Sreenivasan, Policy Coordinator, Canadian Council for International Co-operation

Wednesday, April 28th 7:00pm - 9:00pm
The University of Ottawa - Pavillion Desmarais
55 Laurier East, Room 1120 (First Floor)

For more information please contact Caroline Foster at cfoster@kairoscanada.org

Co-sponsored by:
Canadian Council for International Co-operation - Africa Canada Forum
Halifax Initiative
KAIROS: Canadian Ecumenical Justice Initiatives
School of International Development and Global Studies

Fifteen years is enough - March 2010

Fifteen years is enoughWhat’s changed in the international financial system and its institutions, what hasn’t and what needs to

Executive Summary
Back in 1995, the G7 met in Halifax during a “time of change and opportunity.” The meeting took place in a context of mounting deficits and debt crises in countries in the South; in the wake of economic collapse in Mexico; and amid strong global criticism from civil society, the media and governments about the World Bank and International Monetary Fund’s (IMF) austere neo-liberal structural adjustment policies.

A lot has changed since then, partly in response to the Halifax G7 Summit and subsequent G7 and G8 meetings. Too many of these improvements, however, exist only on paper. Beyond the surface, the neo-liberal, market-oriented bias that guides the Bank and Fund’s agenda and thinking has not altered.

The 2010 G8 Summit in Toronto in 2010 takes place during another “time of change and opportunity.” The financial crisis has spurred many civil society organizations (CSOs) to insist on far-reaching changes to the global financial system and its institutions. Clearly, as this publication will illustrate, 15 years of refusing to deal with the manifest shortcomings of the global economic system is enough.

Event: Parliamentary roundtables on the G8/G20 Agendas - April 20, 26 and 27, 2010

Parliamentary Roundtables on the G8/G20 Agendas

2010 is an important and unique moment for Parliamentarians to engage with Canadians on some of the most important global issues facing our planet and our future.  On June 25th, 2010, Canada will play host to leaders from the Group of Eight countries in Muskoka, followed by a meeting of G20 leaders in Toronto on June 26-27.

To date, there has been little discussion among parliamentarians about the themes leading up to the 2010 summits, and Canadian civil society is looking to engage members from all parties in a discussion around some of the issues highlighted in our civil society platform, An Agenda for Global Development: G8/G20 Civil Society Coalition Platform, endorsed by over 60 organizations across the country.  The platform discusses specific, measurable, realistic recommendations to put poverty eradication, economic recovery for all and environmental justice at the centre of the international agenda.

To facilitate the conversation, Canadian civil society is organizing three parliamentary roundtables to discuss party perspectives on climate change, the financial crisis and the millennium development goals (MDGs). The Roundtables will occur as the G20 Finance Ministers meet in Washington, as G8 Development Ministers meet in Halifax and as Canada hosts the Africa Partnership Forum in Toronto.

Roundtable 1: Climate change
When:     Tuesday, April 20th, 2010 - 9:00 am –11:00 am
Where:    Room 2-2, Booth Building, 165 Sparks Street, Ottawa

Roundtable 2: Global financial crisis
When:     Monday, April 26th, 2010 - 5:00 pm –7:00 pm
Where:    Room 2-2, Booth Building, 165 Sparks Street, Ottawa

Roundtable 3: Millennium Development Goals
When:     Tuesday, April 27th, 2010 - 9:00am –11:00am
Where:    Room 2-2, Booth Building, 165 Sparks Street, Ottawa

ROUNDTABLE DETAILS

Canadian G8 G20 Civil Society Platform

Roundtable Agendas

Moderator, MP and Expert Bios 

Podcasts

Press Responses: Op Ed - The Robin Hood Tax – Its Aim is True

In "Alternatives", April 1, 2010
http://www.alterinter.org/article3457.html?lang=en

T-A-X. Such a simple three letter word, and yet it elicits responses from people out of all proportion to its size. Perhaps it isn’t surprising. Taxes are scary.

But let’s not forget, as much as you may hate them, without them, we wouldn’t have public health care, education, infrastructure, police and ambulances, government, politicians…(OK, maybe scratch that one). You get the idea. Boring and controversial as they are, taxes are essential.

Press Responses: February 3, 2010

Three ways to pay for aid commitments
EMBASSY – Canada’s Foreign Policy Newspaper

Wednesday, February 3, 2010

Stephen Harper’s announcement that child and maternal health will be the signature theme of June’s G8 meeting is certainly timely.

Every day 1,400 women die of pregnancy-related causes.  Every day 24,000 children under the age of five die of what are largely preventable causes. Progress on improving child and maternal health is the furthest off-track of the eight Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) UN member states committed to in 2000. This focus gives MDGs four and five, on child and maternal health, the push they need ahead of September’s United Nations High Level Meeting and ten year review of the MDGs.

But funding the initiative comes during difficult days – a global crisis and a budget deficit. Resources are tight.

Policy Paper: What’s missing in the response to the global financial crisis? - January 2010

Rethinking the international financial system during a time of crisis

Introduction
On October 19 and 20, 2009, the Halifax Initiative held a conference, co-hosted by The North South Institute, the University of Ottawa and the School of International Development and Global Studies (SIDGS), entitled "What’s Missing in the Response to the Global Financial Crisis?" The meeting brought together experts from a range of backgrounds to analyze the challenges facing the global economy, discuss the ways in which the international community has responded to the current financial crisis, and identify shortcomings in these responses.

Monthly Issue Update - January 31, 2010

CSOs push for Common Approaches revamp
Members of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) are currently reviewing a 2007 Council Recommendation regarding export credit agency (ECA) operations. The Recommendation on Common Approaches on the Environment and Officially Supported Export Credits (Common Approaches) is a “gentlemen’s agreement” that seeks to establish a level playing field regarding ECA environmental practice. CSOs argue that the Recommendation’s impact is undermined by the lack of effective accountability mechanisms to ensure consistent and effective application by member governments.

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