U.K. Group Campaigns for Robin Hood Tax on Banks

Actor Bill Nighy, film producer Richard Curtis, and 50 aid organizations in the U.K. are calling for a 0.05% tax on bank transactions, so that that money can be given to the poor.

Just a few months before the Ridley Scott/Russell Crowe movie Robin Hood comes out (the release date is May 14), another actor and filmmaker team — Richard Curtis, the writer of Four Weddings and a Funeral, and actor Bill Nighy — today launched a campaign for a Robin Hood Tax. But where Robin and his Merrie Men stole from rich aristocrats, this coalition of 50 charity and aid groups that Nighy and Curtis support is targeting banks and hopes to raise $400 billion a year through a Tobin tax on bank transactions. Curtis and Nighy have released a video in support of the tax that portrays a clueless banker conceding that the tax is a good idea.

The tax would be levied on banks' transactions with other financial institutions and the rate would start at 0.05%. Organizations supporting the campaign include Oxfam, the TUC, Barnardo's, The Salvation Army, ActionAid and Save the Children.

The campaign is calling for countries that levy the tax to keep half the proceeds domestically and for the rest to be split 50-50 between poverty reduction and tackling climate change.

Polling of U.K. residents carried out by YouGov for Oxfam shows there is already significant public support for a Robin Hood Tax, with almost twice as many people in favor of the policy as oppose it. According to the survey, it is also the preferred option for reducing the U.K.'s deficit — ahead of reducing public spending or raising income tax, VAT or corporation tax.

The campaign website doesn't offer any details about who would distribute the money raised or how decisions about the money would be made.