Panama Papers Inquiry

As the Plenary Chamber of the European Parliament voted yesterday to support an inquiry committee on the Panama Papers scandal, the Greens have been busy voting as well for their 8 representatives to seat in this committee. Being the first political group having decided on its composition yet, we are pleased to introduce you to our Green Team, which will defend European citizens’ interest and do their maximum to shed the light on why the Panama Papers could happen and who should hold political responsibility for it.

Our Members:

EVA JOLY – Eva is a Green MEP from France since 2009 and before that used to be a judge instructing several major financial scandals in France. Eva is a strong anti-corruption advocate and has been advising the Norwegian government in the fight against corruption and financial crime.  She has also worked on anti-corruption in Afghanistan for a United Nations mission. As an MEP, she is a member of the Committee on civil liberties (dealing with anti-money laundering) and of TAXE, the Special committee created to investigate the Luxleaks scandal.

• Twitter: @EvaJoly
• Website: http://evajoly.fr/

MOLLY SCOTT CATO – Molly is a Green MEP from the UK, elected in 2014. As an economist and writer, she has campaigned in the UK for a fairer tax system and has paid special attention to the role of the UK overseas territories in facilitating tax dodging. She is UK Green Party spokesperson on economics and finance, and is a member of the ECON (economic and monetary affairs) and TAXE committees.

• Twitter: @MollyMEP
• Website: http://mollymep.org.uk/

SVEN GIEGOLD – Sven is a German Green MEP from North-Rhine-Westphalia since 2009. He is spokesperson for the German Green group in the European parliament and coordinator of the Greens / EFA group in the ECON committee. Since 2010 he has been rapporteur on the establishment of the European Securities markets Authority (ESMA) and the revision of the European Banking Authority regulation, as well as taxation and European Central Bank related files. He has been the Greens coordinator for the TAXE committee over the past year and a half. As a political economist, Sven is one of the founders of the Tax Justice Network. He has been active in the ecological movement, altermondialism and the German protestant church for over 20 years.

• Twitter: @sven_giegold
• Website: http://www.sven-giegold.de/

PASCAL DURAND – Pascal is a French Green MEP since 2014. He is also the co-founder of Europe-Ecologie in 2008 and the former leader of the French Green Party EELV. Before joining the ecologist movement, he worked 25 years as a lawyer specialised in company law at the Paris Bar. In the European Parliament, he works specifically on tax transparency and company law in the legal affairs committee (JURI). He was the Greens representative for the latest negotiations in JURI about the need for public tax reporting by large companies.

• Twitter: @PDurandOfficiel
• Website: http://europeecologie.eu/-Pascal-Durand-?lang=fr

Our Substitutes:

ERNEST MARAGALL – Ernest is an economist and computer analyst by background and has been elected as MEP in 2014. Previously, he served in Barcelona City Council as Counsellor of the Presidency and the Treasury until 2003, as Secretary of the Catalan government from 2003 to 2006 and from 2006 to 2010, he was Minister of Education. He is a member of the European Free Alliance and seats in the Budget and TAXE committee.

• Twitter: @ernestmaragall
• Website: http://araaeuropa.mesesquerres.cat/

HEIDI HAUTALA - Heidi, previously Minister for international development and state ownership steering in Finland between 2011-2013, is now working her third legislature as MEP in the Greens/EFA group. During her term as a minister she concluded a Government Action Programme to Combat International Tax Avoidance. In the EP she seats in the Legal affairs and Development committees where she has continued her longstanding work on transparency, accountability, access to documents, good governance, rule of law and policy coherence for development.

• Twitter: @HeidiHautala
• Website: http://www.heidihautala.fi/en/

ERNEST URTASUN - Ernest is a Catalan Greens MEP since 2014. He is a member of the economic committee and the Women's Rights and Gender Equality, where he is closely monitoring the impact of the structural reforms in gender and fostering the debate on the impact of tax policies on women’s rights. He also joined the TAXE investigations on the LuxLeaks scandal, where he specially monitored the cases of Andorra. He is also Vice-President of the Euro-Latin American Parliamentary Assembly, where he follows economic issues such as tax justice and illegitimate / odious debt. He was an active member of the Stop Cañete campaign, where the Civil Society denounced the lack of transparency and conflicts of interest of Commissioner Arias Cañete, whose relatives are now mentioned in the Panama Papers scandal.

• Twitter: @ernesturtasun
• Website: https://ernesturtasun.eu/ 

MICHEL REIMON - Michel is a Green MEP from Austria since 2014. Before his political career, he was a journalist and an anti-globalisation activist. He is also an author of several books. Michel is heavily campaigning against free trade agreements and one of the driving forces against TTIP in Austria. His work focusses on injustice brought upon by big companies and lobbies.  Thus his deep interest in shedding light on the kind of tax avoidance uncovered by the Panama Papers scandal. Michel is a substitute member of the ECON Committee and Spokesperson for Competition Policy in the Green Group. As Michel is keen to ensure transparency of the political life, he is constantly informing the public via social media such as Twitter about his political work.

• Twitter: @michelreimon
• Website: https://www.reimon.net/

Our Green Team has already started working on a political roadmap for this inquiry committee, to make the most of our 12 months of investigations. We will publish it in the next couple of weeks, as soon as it is finalised.