Citing Vancouver and Montréal, section 33.1 of the Act exempts prescribed international financial institutions from paying tax on income arising from “international banking centre business,” and from paying tax on income from loans to, and from accepting deposits from, non-residents of Canada who deal at arm’s length with the taxpayer, provided those loans and deposits originate in designated branches or office ...[+++]s.

16. Underlines the fact that restoring investor confidence will require a strengthening of the banks’ capital positions and measures to support their access to funding, as far as possible curtailing short-term remuneration systems and inadequate business models; believes that further reform of the regulation and supervision of the financial sector will be necessary in order to reflect heightened risks in the sovereign and private debt markets, which includes a strengthening of the capital positions of systemic banks, although this must not undermine the competitive position of non-systemic financial institutions; stresses that, after h ...[+++]aving been correctly capitalised, banks should not unduly restrict lending to the real economy and therefore regulatory actions should lay the basis for an increase in their lending capacity; invites the Commission to ensure that the European system of financial supervision maintains bank lending, in particular by those institutions that benefited from crisis-related State aid and the support of ECB liquidity lines; expects the Commission to make its proposals on crisis bank management before Summer 2012; deplores the socialisation of private losses through injections of liquidity in the banking sector and any speculative behaviour by rating agencies and international financial centres;

16. Underlines the fact that restoring investor confidence will require a strengthening of the banks' capital positions and measures to support their access to funding, as far as possible curtailing short-term remuneration systems and inadequate business models; believes that further reform of the regulation and supervision of the financial sector will be necessary in order to reflect heightened risks in the sovereign and private debt markets, which includes a strengthening of the capital positions of systemic banks, although this must not undermine the competitive position of non-systemic financial institutions; stresses that, after h ...[+++]aving been correctly capitalised, banks should not unduly restrict lending to the real economy and therefore regulatory actions should lay the basis for an increase in their lending capacity; invites the Commission to ensure that the European system of financial supervision maintains bank lending, in particular by those institutions that benefited from crisis-related State aid and the support of ECB liquidity lines; expects the Commission to make its proposals on crisis bank management before Summer 2012; deplores the socialisation of private losses through injections of liquidity in the banking sector and any speculative behaviour by rating agencies and international financial centres;

– (FR) Mr President, we are going through the worst global financial crisis since 1929 and therefore, Europe must not stand idly by. Moreover, the regulation of the international financial system is not a matter for the right, the left, or even the centre: it concerns everyone throughout the world. I firmly believe that Europe must play a leading role, as it was able to do last March when it called on the Commission and the Member ...[+++]States to focus on the issue of taxing international financial activities.

31. Notes the new Debt Sustainability Framework of the IMF and the World Bank with regard to Low Income Countries (LICs); welcomes the fact that the new Framework aims to put debt at the centre of the international financial institutions’ decision making process; regrets that the proposal as a whole does not come close to addressing the problem of long-term, real sustainability in terms of creating conditions for low income countries to attain the MDGs;

Just as the Cotonou Agreement incorporates the rules of economic and international financial institutions, in the interests of consistency and compatibility it must take account of the objectives and mechanisms of international environment conventions (the Convention on Climate Change and Kyoto Protocol, the Biodiversity Convention, the Montreal Protocol on Substances that Deplete the Ozone Layer).