The problem with the Anna Hazare plan

By C P Surendran in The Times of India

A most comical anti-corruption opera is being staged all over the country under the leadership of Anna Hazare, who in his moral tyranny is actually beginning to look like Mahatma Gandhi. This itself is a bit of laugh: when a man wants to be someone else eventually transmigration of the soul and nose happens. It only remains for Anna to hold the Dandi March.




But the real reason why this anti-corruption campaign is looking like an over-stretched Johnny Lever joke is that the people largely constituting the movement have happily externalized corruption as if it's an event happening outside themselves.



The fact is that the petite bourgeoisie-auto rickshaw drivers, and constables, if Haryana Police Sangathan support for Jan Lok Pal's bill is any indication, and low paid government officials and assorted elements-have no idea that they are very much part of the corruption. They believe it is a disease outside them, primarily endemic to the government and its institutions, when they are active players in the drama.



The others who are a part of the movement, including the youngsters, who this lookist country swears by, are there for an opportunity to hold candles and chant Sarojini Naidu kind of poems which normally begin: O, deliverer… The youth will hold a candle and even burn a finger from the dripping wax, but when it comes to admission, if an IIT director or an engineering college dean will accept cash for seats, they will gladly part with it.



For one with passing interest in the Lokpal politics, the only major difference in the bills drafted by the government and Anna apart from bringing the PM into the bill's ambit, seems to be that the government wants to set up a separate investigative agency while Anna and his team want an existing investigating agency like the CBI to report to the Lokpal committee. That would eventually mean the Lokpal evolving into a parallel power vortex, and might make Parliament redundant.



In other words, those whom you elected will not be of as much consequence as those self-appointed or government nominated Lokpal committee members. That is a fraught process, and actually might create more unaccountability and corruption.



That is one part of the joke. The other, equally entertaining part has been the Congress-led UPA government's complete and visible bankruptcy of ideas to tackle an agitation outside party structures. Much the same happened before the Emergency when Jayaparakash Naryan led a movement that cut across party lines against the Indira Gandhi led Congress government, which panicked and declared an Emergency.



Anna's movement is mostly apolitical. And the support it has drawn, for all its faults, is an indication how political parties and other democratic institutions have failed to represent people, or inspire faith. Across the world, memberships of political parties are decreasing. Alternate people's groupings with environmental and ethical themes are gaining strength. In Europe and America where democracies are institutionally stronger and fairer than in India, this could be explained as an evolution.



But, in India where fairness woven into the system is at best fraying, when a movement is directed primarily against its institutions and the political party in power as well as the ones in Opposition are fumbling in their response, a movement like this can have dire consequences. Clearly, the parties have failed to represent the people, which is why a moral tyrant like Anna is holding the government to ransom. When institutions fail, individuals take up their role. .And if Anna wins, the nature of Indian politics will change.



It'd be fun to see who were the advisors who landed a wimp like Prime Minister Manmohan Singh into the Lok Pal soup. A party that can't argue its case against a retired army truck driver whose only strength really is a kind of stolid integrity and a talent for skipping meals doesn't deserve to be in power. Power goes to people who love it. Anna Hazare loves nothing more than power.

Students name best (and worst) universities

By Richard Garner, Education Editor and Laurie Martin
Wednesday, 17 August 2011

 

A year is a long time in the world of higher education. A university that has been the most expensive in the country will become one of the best in terms of value for money next year.

The University of Buckingham is ranked third in a table of student satisfaction published today – but those above it will be charging the maximum £9,000 a year for a three-year course.

Professor Terence Keeley, the vice-chancellor, said "We're going from the most expensive university in the UK to the cheapest," he said yesterday, "and we still don't know how to handle that psychologically."
Buckingham, the UK's only private university, scores 93 per cent in a table showing the percentage of students sat each university satisfied with their courses – putting it in third place.

Top of the league table is the higher charging Brighton and Sussex Medical School followed by Cambridge University.

The table, however, would appear to show that if students are looking for value for money next year, they need to look outside of the traditional state-funded university you can go away to and study at for three years.
All those in the top ten that can charge £9,000 a year for their courses and those in England are doing so.
Buckingham University, who will be charging £7,500 a year for a three-year course, and the Open University, which is charging £5,000 a year, are the exceptions.

In Buckingham's case, courses are spread over a two-year period – so the actual cost is £11,250. However, that is still significantly less than the £27,000 for a three-year course at a university charging the maximum.
Professor Keeley is clear as to why students rate the university.

"That's straightforward," he said. "In every other university in Britain, the client is the Government – so they have to work to government targets. Here the client is the student."

Christina Lloyd, director of teaching and learning at the Open University – which has been in the top three for the past seven years, added: "As students become more focused on their finances, quality, value for money and the student experience are more important than ever."

Overall, 83 per cent of students who responded to this year's national student survey said they were satisfied with their courses, nine per cent were dissatisfied and eight per cent said they did not know.

Individual figures ranged from 95 per cent for Brighton and Sussex Medical school to just 67 per cent for Ravensbourne College, a university sector college specialising in digital media and design.

In the further education sector, the figures were more varied with 100 per cent satisfaction registered at Trafford College in Greater Manchester but only 39 per cent in Barnfield College.in Luton and Bedford.
Whilst universities were pleased that the overall satisfaction figures were a slight increase on last year, there was a warning of the impact cuts and rises in fees could have.

THE US Rating Downgrade Explained - Finance capital is trying to impose the same fiscal austerity on the US as it had foisted on the eurozone.

(From Economic and Political Weekly India's editorial)

 The issuers of mortgage-backed securities (MBS) during the housing boom in the United States in the first few years of the 2000s paid the credit rating agencies – Moody’s, Standard & Poor’s (S&P), and Fitch – for the top ratings that the latter bestowed on those debt instruments. Thank heavens it was not the investors (in those securities) who had to compensate the credit rating agencies for the AAA credit ratings that they gave
the MBS shortly before the market collapsed and the securities defaulted. Now, on 5 August, one of them, S&P, became really audacious – it downgraded US Treasury securities, ignoring the
fact that, unlike in the case of the 17 countries in the European Monetary Union, the US Federal Reserve can sustain the government’s fiscal deficits and refinance the public debt by purchasing the Treasury’s securities. What may have provoked S&P into the act?

Can the turmoil on the financial markets since the downgrade be attributed to what S&P did? What may be the repercussions of “the deal” between the Barack Obama administration and the Republicans in Congress that permitted an enhancement of the ceiling on the US public debt based, of course, on the quid pro quo
of fiscal deficit reduction, a bargain that US finance capital was presumably not content with?

But, first, what about the settlement between President Obama and the Republicans? From the perspective of S&P’s credit rating, the question was one of sustainability of the public debt. Presumably, even after the agreement to reduce the projected fiscal deficit by $2.1 trillion over the next 10 years,
the projected public debt to gross domestic product (GDP) was rapidly rising from 2015 to 2021. S&P and US finance capital wanted double the cut in the fiscal deficit over the same period. But let us come to the expenditure reduction of $917 billion over the next 10 years that will permit a $1 trillion increase in the
debt ceiling. The many expenditure reductions that this will require have more to do with infrastructure, education, housing, community services, etc, than with defence and homeland security. And, a further $1.2 billion reduction in expenditure – again, more to do with entitlements than with defence – is on
the anvil, besides a balanced budget amendment. So severe cuts in social security, including Medicare, are very much on the agenda. In reality, it seems the Obama administration is not much at odds with the Republicans as regards these cuts, but, of course, the president is seeking another term in office, come November 2012, and so he could not have been able to meet finance capital’s demands to the full.

US public debt has risen rapidly since 2000, but the main reasons for this are the tax cuts for corporations and the rich, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan (besides the otherwise huge increase in defence expenditure), the costly bailouts of banks, insurance companies and corporations such as the auto companies, and, of
course, the stimulus spending during the Great Recession. The deal with the Republicans will not affect the tax cuts, defence, and the bailouts. But more ominous is the fact of economic stagnation – the first and second quarter 2011 growth rates of 0.3% and 1.3% are dismal for an economy that is claimed to be recovering from the Great Recession. The cuts in government expenditure – coming at a time when additional private consumption and private investment are not forthcoming, and when the US cannot match
the neo-mercantilist powers like Germany and China – may, most likely, push the economy into another recession which will bring on even higher fiscal deficits. In fact, interest rates have declined
in the wake of S&P’s decision! And, of course, with the central banks of the 17 out of 27 countries of the European Union (EU) not allowed to sustain their respective governments’ fiscal deficits and refinance public debt by purchasing their governments’ securities, no solution of the eurozone’s debt crises is in sight.

Even as we look at S&P’s downgrading of US public debt, it might be worth a while to comment on the eurozone’s debt crisis, for the contrast may be enlightening. Here the problem has its roots in the EU’s Stability Pact which commits member states not to increase their fiscal deficits beyond 3% and their public debt to GDP beyond 60%. Countries that violate these stipulations are forced to borrow short-term on the private capital markets for their central banks are not permitted to sustain such fiscal deficits, and are
thus not allowed to refinance public debt by purchasing their government’s securities. The crucial link between monetary and fiscal policy is thus deliberately snapped. Now, besides Spain, Greece and Portugal, Italy too faces a public debt crisis that has its roots in such a financial architecture, and the people are forced
to bear the brunt of the draconian austerity measures imposed.

The United Kingdom (UK) would have also been in a similar boat if the eurozone criteria had applied to it. The financial markets would then have doubted the government’s ability to refinance the public debt because the link between the Treasury and the Bank of England would have been snapped.One might be thankful that the UK is not a part of the eurozone given the current social turmoil it is facing. Much of the eurozone countries’ mercantilist strategies have exacerbated the EU’s macroeconomic problems with their competitive drives to push down the wage relative to labour productivity, this, in the absence of a national currency whose value could have otherwise been depreciated.

Now, the US’ problems are not that of the eurozone but finance capital could not care less. It is trying to impose the eurozone’s fiscal responsibility standards on Washington, and, in this, S&P is its instrument. Finance capital will, after all, snatch as much of its share of the return on capital that it can, and, this, by any and all available means at its disposal, even if this robs the people at large of their very means of keeping body and soul together.

Oprah and the philanthropy that chokes

Billionaire celebrities want to save the world Oprah Winfrey-style. But their giving has a price

• 
• • Priyamvada Gopal
  • guardian.co.uk, Sunday 14 August 2011 17.36 BST
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Oprah Winfrey has given money to New Orleans, HIV/Aids prevention, abused women's shelters and private scholarships. Photograph: Mario Anzuoni/Reuters
Media empress Oprah Winfrey has been nominated for a special Oscar, the Jean Hersholt award, for those "whose humanitarian efforts have brought credit to the industry". This has created mild controversy in the US, with some charging that she is insufficiently Hollywood to merit an award held by the likes of Elizabeth Taylor and Paul Newman. But Winfrey is as good a choice as any to confer an aura of piety on an industry better known for lavish lifestyles than saving the world. Her contributions to charitable causes have included reconstruction in New Orleans, HIV/Aids prevention, abused women's shelters, church charities and private school scholarships for disadvantaged children. More interesting is why humanitarianism has assumed such importance as a must-be-seen-to-be-doing-it activity for the rich and the famous. From the obligatory royal photo-op with the homeless on LA's Skid Row to the ubiquitous images of white female celebrities cradling African babies, exhibitionist "caring" is as essential a marker of wealth and celebrity as signature scents and personal assistants. It's too easy to argue this is about mitigating guilt and resentment. More significant is how billionaire benevolence is closely tied to the big neoliberal political manoeuvres of our time. This relationship can be scrutinised without necessarily questioning Winfrey's personal sincerity or denying that wealthy giving benefits a few. Brand Oprah is a seamless and hugely influential melding of capitalism, self-help, humanitarian aspirations and spirituality. Endless consumption is encouraged by personal recommendations and lavish freebies from iPods to jewellery. At the same time, disciples can practise tasteful austerity with "debt diets" reminding us that "we are all responsible for everything that happens to us". The poor, too, are responsible both for their condition and for overcoming it. Buying things for the deserving poor – and Winfrey is clear that they are not all deserving – must be seen as "giving them bootstraps". Pledging to "destroy the welfare mentality", Winfrey has often suggested that receiving state assistance is a choice, one she herself rejected. Her grand philanthropic acts, such as the failed experiment to move 100 Chicago families into private housing during Bill Clinton's "welfare reform" efforts, are accompanied by politically welcomed criticism of public assistance as dependence. Yet as psychologist Bruce Levine notes, it is precisely "fundamentalist consumerism" which destroys self-reliance. Winfrey has been justifiably accused by activists of "reinforcing the US war on the poor" by blaming victims. In practising what should really be called "humanitarian privatisation", Winfrey and other philanthropists like Bill Gates have targeted public education with missionary zeal, speaking authoritatively on a subject they know little about. Having decided not to donate to inner-city public schools after criticising them and deeming their students unwilling to learn, Winfrey has publicly backed those advocating "charter schools", the US equivalent of free schools – including Gates and the makers of a controversial film, Waiting for "Superman", which attacks teachers and unions. In a parallel move, Rupert Murdoch is going ahead with plans to sponsor an academy in east London over the objections of the local council. The billionaire "humanitarianism" of Winfrey, Gates and Murdoch is deeply compromised not only by its failure to acknowledge the causal relationship between extreme wealth and great poverty but by participating in an ideological assault on the welfare state. It posits itself as the only way to change the world – from above and with a wealthy few firmly in control. A Hollywood celebrity more worthy of our respect is Matt Damon who, as American schoolteachers demonstrated this month in a Save Our Schools rally, confronted media suggestions that job security made teachers lazy. In a video clip that has gone viral, Damon lambasts "MBA-style thinking" as "the problem with [education] policy right now". This solidarity with the aspirations of the many and not the self-interested paternalism of the few is the humanitarianism that our times call for.

• © 2011 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved.

Are beautiful people 'selfish by nature'?

People with symmetrical faces are more self-sufficient and less likely to co-operate, new research suggests

• Jamie Doward and Bradley Wilkinson
• The Observer, Sunday 14 August 2011
• larger | smaller

A study suggests that people with symmetrical faces, such as Natalie Portman, are naturally more self-sufficient. Photograph: Steve Granitz/WireImage
Kate Moss, George Clooney, Natalie Portman or Cristiano Ronaldo may be many people's ideas of dream dates, but pioneering research that combines economics with biology suggests they may not be perfect life partners. According to a study to be discussed this month at a gathering of Nobel prizewinners, people blessed with more symmetrical facial features, which are considered more attractive, are less likely to co-operate and more likely to selfishly focus on their own interests. Santiago Sanchez-Pages, who works at the universities of Barcelona and Edinburgh, and Enrique Turiegano, of the Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, base their claims on the "prisoner's dilemma" model of behaviour, played out under laboratory conditions. Two players were each given the option of being a "dove" and co-operating for the greater good; or a "hawk", taking the selfish option, with a chance of gaining more if the other player chose "dove" and co-operated. The subjects' faces were then analysed. The study found that people with more symmetrical faces were less likely to co-operate and less likely to expect others to co-operate. The findings will be presented at the annual Nobel Laureate Meetings in Lindau, Germany, from 23 to 27 August. The explanation may be found in evolution. The two academics speculate that, on a subconscious level, people tend to view symmetrical physical attributes as a sign of good health and find people with them more attractive as a result. Earlier studies have suggested that individuals with symmetrical faces tend to suffer fewer congenital diseases and therefore make better potential mating partners. As a result, the studies suggest, they are more self-sufficient and have less need for seeking the help of others. The pair write: "As people with symmetrical faces tend to be healthier and more attractive, they are also more self-sufficient and have less of an incentive to co-operate and seek help from others. Through natural selection over thousands of years, these characteristics continue to the present day." The authors also examine the relationship between co-operation levels and exposure to testosterone during development. Testosterone is usually associated with aggressive behaviour, suggesting "alpha males" do not make great team players. But the authors suggest this is only a partial truth and that testosterone can promote co-operative behaviour. They write: "Subjects exposed to higher levels of testosterone during foetal development did not co-operate less than the rest and even co-operated more than subjects with average levels. It seems that leading co-operation and not necessarily obtaining a higher individual profit are seen by some as a source of status." The pair warn against jumping to the "simplistic conclusion" that facial asymmetry or testosterone can be used to predict a person's behaviour, but they suggest their research could help to design public policies and act as a corrective to purely economic-based decision making. They note: "If certain behaviours such as smoking, drinking or high-speed driving are perceived by those who engage in them as part of their quest for status, it is very unlikely that providing economic disincentives like higher taxes, prices or fines will have a strong deterrent effect."

• © 2011 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved.

The Rioters' Defence

By Peter Oborne Politics Last updated: August 11th, 2011 in The Telegraph


David Cameron, Ed Miliband and the entire British political class came together yesterday to denounce the rioters. They were of course right to say that the actions of these looters, arsonists and muggers were abhorrent and criminal, and that the police should be given more support.

But there was also something very phony and hypocritical about all the shock and outrage expressed in parliament. MPs spoke about the week’s dreadful events as if they were nothing to do with them.
I cannot accept that this is the case. Indeed, I believe that the criminality in our streets cannot be dissociated from the moral disintegration in the highest ranks of modern British society. The last two decades have seen a terrifying decline in standards among the British governing elite. It has become acceptable for our politicians to lie and to cheat. An almost universal culture of selfishness and greed has grown up.

It is not just the feral youth of Tottenham who have forgotten they have duties as well as rights. So have the feral rich of Chelsea and Kensington. A few years ago, my wife and I went to a dinner party in a large house in west London. A security guard prowled along the street outside, and there was much talk of the “north-south divide”, which I took literally for a while until I realised that my hosts were facetiously referring to the difference between those who lived north and south of Kensington High Street.

Most of the people in this very expensive street were every bit as deracinated and cut off from the rest of Britain as the young, unemployed men and women who have caused such terrible damage over the last few days. For them, the repellent Financial Times magazine How to Spend It is a bible. I’d guess that few of them bother to pay British tax if they can avoid it, and that fewer still feel the sense of obligation to society that only a few decades ago came naturally to the wealthy and better off.

Yet we celebrate people who live empty lives like this. A few weeks ago, I noticed an item in a newspaper saying that the business tycoon Sir Richard Branson was thinking of moving his headquarters to Switzerland. This move was represented as a potential blow to the Chancellor of the Exchequer, George Osborne, because it meant less tax revenue.

I couldn’t help thinking that in a sane and decent world such a move would be a blow to Sir Richard, not the Chancellor. People would note that a prominent and wealthy businessman was avoiding British tax and think less of him. Instead, he has a knighthood and is widely feted. The same is true of the brilliant retailer Sir Philip Green. Sir Philip’s businesses could never survive but for Britain’s famous social and political stability, our transport system to shift his goods and our schools to educate his workers.

Yet Sir Philip, who a few years ago sent an extraordinary £1 billion dividend offshore, seems to have little intention of paying for much of this. Why does nobody get angry or hold him culpable? I know that he employs expensive tax lawyers and that everything he does is legal, but he surely faces ethical and moral questions just as much as does a young thug who breaks into one of Sir Philip’s shops and steals from it?

Our politicians – standing sanctimoniously on their hind legs in the Commons yesterday – are just as bad. They have shown themselves prepared to ignore common decency and, in some cases, to break the law. David Cameron is happy to have some of the worst offenders in his Cabinet. Take the example of Francis Maude, who is charged with tackling public sector waste – which trade unions say is a euphemism for waging war on low‑paid workers. Yet Mr Maude made tens of thousands of pounds by breaching the spirit, though not the law, surrounding MPs’ allowances.

A great deal has been made over the past few days of the greed of the rioters for consumer goods, not least by Rotherham MP Denis MacShane who accurately remarked, “What the looters wanted was for a few minutes to enter the world of Sloane Street consumption.” This from a man who notoriously claimed £5,900 for eight laptops. Of course, as an MP he obtained these laptops legally through his expenses.

Yesterday, the veteran Labour MP Gerald Kaufman asked the Prime Minister to consider how these rioters can be “reclaimed” by society. Yes, this is indeed the same Gerald Kaufman who submitted a claim for three months’ expenses totalling £14,301.60, which included £8,865 for a Bang & Olufsen television.

Or take the Salford MP Hazel Blears, who has been loudly calling for draconian action against the looters. I find it very hard to make any kind of ethical distinction between Blears’s expense cheating and tax avoidance, and the straight robbery carried out by the looters.

The Prime Minister showed no sign that he understood that something stank about yesterday’s Commons debate. He spoke of morality, but only as something which applies to the very poor: “We will restore a stronger sense of morality and responsibility – in every town, in every street and in every estate.” He appeared not to grasp that this should apply to the rich and powerful as well.

The tragic truth is that Mr Cameron is himself guilty of failing this test. It is scarcely six weeks since he jauntily turned up at the News International summer party, even though the media group was at the time subject to not one but two police investigations. Even more notoriously, he awarded a senior Downing Street job to the former News of the World editor Andy Coulson, even though he knew at the time that Coulson had resigned after criminal acts were committed under his editorship. The Prime Minister excused his wretched judgment by proclaiming that “everybody deserves a second chance”. It was very telling yesterday that he did not talk of second chances as he pledged exemplary punishment for the rioters and looters.

These double standards from Downing Street are symptomatic of widespread double standards at the very top of our society. It should be stressed that most people (including, I know, Telegraph readers) continue to believe in honesty, decency, hard work, and putting back into society at least as much as they take out.
But there are those who do not. Certainly, the so-called feral youth seem oblivious to decency and morality. But so are the venal rich and powerful – too many of our bankers, footballers, wealthy businessmen and politicians.

Of course, most of them are smart and wealthy enough to make sure that they obey the law. That cannot be said of the sad young men and women, without hope or aspiration, who have caused such mayhem and chaos over the past few days. But the rioters have this defence: they are just following the example set by senior and respected figures in society. Let’s bear in mind that many of the youths in our inner cities have never been trained in decent values. All they have ever known is barbarism. Our politicians and bankers, in sharp contrast, tend to have been to good schools and universities and to have been given every opportunity in life.

Something has gone horribly wrong in Britain. If we are ever to confront the problems which have been exposed in the past week, it is essential to bear in mind that they do not only exist in inner-city housing estates.
The culture of greed and impunity we are witnessing on our TV screens stretches right up into corporate boardrooms and the Cabinet. It embraces the police and large parts of our media. It is not just its damaged youth, but Britain itself that needs a moral reformation.

German tax dodgers with money hidden in Swiss banks can sleep easy tonight.

Germany has set back the fight against tax evasion

Those who squirrel away undeclared wealth in Switzerland will be pleased by this deal. What's worse, the UK may follow suit

• 
• • David McNair
  • guardian.co.uk, Friday 12 August 2011 08.00 BST
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'Germany is setting back years of work towards the global prize of ending banking secrecy in the world's most pervasive tax haven.' Photograph: Arnd Wiegmann/Reuters/Corbis
 
 
 German tax dodgers with money hidden in Swiss banks can sleep easy tonight. For the German government this week initialled a beggar-thy-neighbour deal that undermines years of diplomatic work to penetrate Switzerland's globally corrosive banking secrecy. The agreement, which is due to be signed by both governments over the next few weeks, sees Germany accepting a paltry $2.8bn upfront from the Swiss banks said to hold some $276bn of Germans' undeclared wealth . In addition, the deal says that Germans will in future be taxed at 26% on the income from their Alpine accounts – money the Swiss authorities will then hand over to Germany. But the Germans with secret accounts will not be forced to tell the taxman that they are hiding their wealth abroad. Their identities will remain secret, allowing Swiss bankers to keep their boasts about "privacy" and "confidentiality".  Both governments are spinning their agreement as a huge success for international co-operation and the fight against tax evasion. In fact, Germany is setting back years of work towards the global prize of ending banking secrecy in the world's most pervasive tax haven. It has dealt a serious blow to prospects for automatic, multilateral exchange of tax-related information between governments, which is the gold standard for deterring tax dodging. German Tax Justice Campaigners are hoping the deal with Switzerland can be repealed. But what about the scores of countries without the economic and political clout to negotiate such agreements with Switzerland? How are they to capture some of the billions they are haemorrhaging as a result of tax dodging and corruption? They are reliant on the kind on international co-operation that NGOs including Christian Aid are fighting for, in order to End Tax Haven Secrecy. There may be worse to come. Here in the UK, HM Treasury is negotiating a similar agreement with Switzerland. It has simply been biding its time to see what kind of deal Germany gets. With the UK government pursuing such a self-interested and myopic policy, it is no surprise that senior UK diplomats appear distinctly disinterested in playing ball at the G20, where a truly global deal to end tax haven secrecy could be brokered. A former senior US Treasury official, who used to negotiate tax treaties for the US, recently told me of his fury about how these dirty deals are undoing a whole career's worth of work against financial secrecy. Such is the scourge of tax havens that the Tax Justice Network estimate assets held offshore total $11.5tn – which if taxed could yield revenues in excess of $225bn. This is money that could be paying for schools, hospitals, university fees and so on – not only in the developed world but also in developing countries. It is $11.5tn that could be used productively in the global economy rather than stashed away in an Alpine tax haven for private gain. Meanwhile, the real Swiss economy doesn't seem to be benefiting too much from the influx of dodgy capital. Its government this week met for a third unscheduled session to grapple with curbing the surging value of the Swiss franc, which is damaging Swiss exports and sending the economy down a precarious path. Yet again, it is vested interests who are winning out over the real economy and the everyday citizens who are being deprived of essential services, whether in Basel, Berlin or Bamako.

• © 2011 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved.