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The Iconic Big Ben Tower in London
Over a decade ago, the Labour Party in the United Kingdom put forth a provocative idea: multinational corporations should be obliged to publicly disclose their profits and tax payments in each country they operate within.
This proposal was designed to ignite discussion and encourage deliberation—especially since, at that time, Labour was not the ruling party and Prime Minister David Cameron had no interest in enforcing mandatory public reporting on a country-by-country basis. However, despite this lack of support from Cameron’s administration, the dialogue surrounding transparency persisted.
OXFORD, ENGLAND – MAY 03: British Prime Minister David Cameron speaks at Oxford University’s newly opened ‘Li Ka Shing Centre for Health Information and Discovery’ on May 3, 2013. (Photo by Oli Scarff/Getty Images)
By 2016, UK lawmakers reached a compromise during discussions of that year’s finance bill: While public country-by-country reporting wouldn’t be mandated outright, HM Treasury retained the option to implement it at their discretion.
The notion of public
