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Martin Atkin

03 May 2017 09:13:38

As Antoine Deltour and Raphaël Halet - better known as the Luxleaks whistleblowers - prepare for the next legal battle to clear their names, it’s worth remembering that it was only thanks to the much-vilified “mainstream media” that the tax avoidance scandal was exposed. Leaked documents do not make a story by themselves - it also takes independent, determined journalism. The two former PwC employees are appealing against revised sentences handed down by a Luxembourg court for their part in exposing how multinational corporations used secret tax deals with the Grand Duchy to dodge taxes around the world. Although the court reduced their original punishments, the pair are fighting to clear their names altogether. But the whistleblowers deserve praise – not punishment. They were prosecuted ...

Maria Romero, Mathieu Vervynckt

01 Mar 2017 16:26:56

This blog was originally published on Devex. For many years, public-private partnerships have been promoted by governments and financial institutions as a way to pay for development projects such as roads, schools and hospitals. The World Bank is at the forefront of this push and advises governments on how to structure their PPPs. But it also ignores civil society campaigners’ concerns about the dangerous hidden debts that PPP projects can lead to. The European Network on Debt and Development, and more than 75 nongovernmental organizations and trade unions from all over the world, will not participate in the World Bank’s public consultations on PPPs until this dangerous problem is tackled. What are PPPs? PPPs are agreements in which the private sector essentially replaces governments ...