Finance committee  Well, I just don't know. Remember, we have bodies that execute. For example, at the G-20 meeting you have the OECD, the Royal Bank, and the IMF. You have the financial stability forums that--

Finance committee  It would be good if that were the case, but I haven't seen it yet. For example, with the financial crisis countries have taken quite different views about stimulus programs, as opposed to tax cuts--

Finance committee  Those are probably questions for the Treasury Board to address, as I did when I was there. In other words, what is the optimum number of employees you need in a particular area of activity without prejudicing that activity? Perhaps there are other ways of addressing the same problem with less human power.

Finance committee  We don't know how much money. That's one of the big questions, isn't it? I don't think anybody knows how much money we're talking about, but we're beginning to suspect that it's very substantial. And how much is being recovered out of the total mass through voluntary disclosure?

Finance committee  The question is a bit difficult, because you have to have trade agreements. I'm a great believer in multilateral trade agreements, as opposed to RTAs, as they're called, bilateral trade agreements. But the latter have become necessary because of the failure or slow-down in completing the Doha round of negotiations on trade.

Finance committee  I'm doing several NGO-type activities. But professionally I'm a consultant to a foundation in Geneva, which is focused on education, health, and the environment, with the primary focus on Africa at the moment—Liberia in particular. That's about half of my time. The other half of my time I'm back as counsel to the law firm of which I was a founder in 1973.

Finance committee  The attitude of the legislatures and the courts has evolved somewhat from the days of the Duke of Westminster case, which you may recall. That was an example, which was the classic case, of tax avoidance. I don't know whether any of you are tax specialists here. Then we began the role of asking what the intention was, and we know there's much more discretion given to tax authorities than in the past.

Finance committee  I think you should be active on it. The important thing is to bring that process to a satisfactory conclusion. There will always be tax evasion; there's no question about that. There will always be fraud; there will always be bank robbers. The fact is that the progress that has been made, I would say over the last five years, from what I read and in my discussions with OECD officials, is really quite remarkable.

Finance committee  Corporate welfare bums was the term used. To some extent, you are right. Otherwise, as I explained, we would not be taking an in-depth look at how to solve the problem right now. That does not mean we should do away with all the activities that these corporations engage in, especially insurance corporations.

Finance committee  Good question.

Finance committee  It seems to me that is for parliamentarians to decide. The flip side of that argument is that voluntary disclosures result in more income more quickly. Then you have what they call “naming and shaming”, which could be useful, but we are talking about confidential information. You discussed that with Mr.

Finance committee  That's difficult for me to judge. It's going to be different from country to country. When I was President of the Treasury Board here, we always had that argument with the tax department. If we had more inspectors it would increase exponentially the amount of revenue that could be recovered.

Finance committee  If we had that good faith historically we wouldn't be having the debates we're having today and the activity within the OECD. There have been many countries that have not been cooperative. Now with the double taxation conventions, DTC, and I think it's article 26 or whatever it is that incorporates these obligations of exchange of information, if they're complied with then I think we've come a long way to solving that problem, independent of the fact that there's nothing in the trade agreements or the investments agreements per se.

Finance committee  Are you asking me if the OECD has done that?

Finance committee  Absolutely. My experience with the OECD, not just on tax issues--as you know, we cover the full range of public policy outside of defence and maybe culture.... We have 150 committees and working groups. They all, of course, are usually manned with delegates from capitals, and they're supported also by business, the business industry advisory council, and the trade union council.