In Whose Interest? The UK’s Role in Privatising Education Around The World

In Whose Interest? The UK’s Role in Privatising Education Around The World

Report for Global Justice Now and National Education Union (April 2019)

Curtis Research undertook research for this report which examines how aid from the UK’s Department for International Development is promoting the privatisation of education through grants to education businesses, support for pro-private research and consultancy contracts with UK-based businesses, among other methods. It illustrates how privatisation is problematic in terms of equality, quality, and accountability in education, and how it is undermining public education systems.

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Making Tax Work for Girls’ Education: How and why governments can reduce tax incentives to invest more in girls’ education

Making Tax Work for Girls’ Education: How and why governments can reduce tax incentives to invest more in girls’ education

Report for ActionAid (February 2018)

This report presents new research in four developing countries – Malawi, Mozambique, Nepal and Tanzania – and shows: How much revenue these governments are losing to tax incentives, including from the tax treaties they have signed with other countries; What it would cost these countries to provide all girls with full access to primary education, and; How much this investment in girls’ education would benefit not only the girls themselves but the economy as a whole.

The research finds that:

  • Three of the four countries are losing more than half a billion dollars a year to tax incentives
  • The costs of educating all girls currently out of primary school is miniscule by comparison. Tanzania, for example, loses 15 times more in tax incentives each year than it would cost to educate all girls currently out of primary school
  • Two countries, Mozambique and Nepal, would gain more than $1 billion by educating all girls currently out of primary school over their 45 year working lives.

There are 61 million children of primary school age around the world who are out of school – most of whom are girls. To ensure that all girls have a good quality education, governments in developing countries need to increase their spending on education and improve its quality. One key way to raise extra resources is by increasing tax revenues, and one major way to do that is to reduce or eliminate the tax incentives that many governments now offer, especially to corporations.

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Increasing Global Education Financing: Bold and Credible Pledges to Achieve Sustainable Change

Increasing Global Education Financing: Bold and Credible Pledges to Achieve Sustainable Change

Briefing for Global Campaign for Education (June 2017, published online October 2017)

Developing country governments have committed to ensuring inclusive and equitable quality education and lifelong learning for all by 2030, but to achieve this requires greater education spending: to at least 4-6% of GDP and 15-20% of national total budgets. Currently, low-income countries allocate an average of 16.7% of their national budgets to education (Sub-Saharan Africa 16.6%; South Asia 15.3%). UNESCO estimates that government spending on education by low-income countries will need to increase by 50% as a share of GDP by 2030. Governments can and must increase resources allocated to education, and ensure that this funding is spent equitably and effectively to secure the right to free, quality education. This briefing analyses why and how they should do this. Domestic resources to finance this extra education spending can be found. In particular, developing countries should expand their tax bases in progressive ways to ensure that they are raising at least 20% of their GDP in tax revenues. Currently, low-income countries raise on average around 16%, compared to around 33% in OECD countries.

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Out of Pocket: How much are parents paying for public education that should be free?

Out of Pocket: How much are parents paying for public education that should be free?

Policy brief for ActionAid (August 2017)

According to international human rights law, primary education should be free of charge, and secondary education should be made progressively free. Yet in developing countries education is rarely entirely free: despite international obligations, many states continue to impose fees to access primary education. At the same time, families, many among the poorest in the world, have to pay the ‘indirect’ costs of education, such as for school books, uniforms or school maintenance. This briefing provides new figures on the costs incurred by parents when sending their children to school. These costs must be paid by the state, and no child should ever be denied access to education because of inability to pay the fees. Governments need to invest much more in providing a quality education for all their children – one which is truly free.

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Missed Opportunity: How could funds lost to tax incentives in Africa be used to fill the education finance gap?

Missed Opportunity: How could funds lost to tax incentives in Africa be used to fill the education finance gap?

Policy brief for ActionAid (August 2017)

How much revenue do African governments lose from providing tax incentives, such as giving companies tax holidays and exemptions on paying taxes on import duties and value added tax? And if these precious national budget resources were set aside to fund quality, public education instead, how much greater could education spending be? This brief provides figures for revenue losses from tax incentives for several African countries. It concludes that governments in sub-Saharan Africa may be losing US$38.6 billion a year, or 2.4% of their GDP, to tax incentives. This is equivalent to nearly half (47%) of their current education spending. Having a much clearer pro-poor policy for granting incentives and using some of these resources to fund education could provide a much-needed and significant boost to education budgets across Africa.

 

 

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Lost Revenues in Low Income Countries

Lost Revenues in Low Income Countries

Report with Dr Bernadette O’Hare (July 2017)

This research estimates how much revenue six low income countries – of which five are in sub Saharan Africa – are losing unnecessarily from various potential revenue streams that could be used to fund public services. Developing countries can lose revenue in a variety of ways. Here we estimate how much is being lost from the following sources:
Tax avoidance by multinational companies; Providing tax incentives (for example, reductions or exemptions from the payment of corporate taxes) which constitute government ‘tax expenditure’; Not collecting taxes from a proportion of business activity in the informal sector; Corruption in the national budget; and Debt interest payments to international creditors. The research finds that revenue losses are large in all countries, which has significant implications for development. The priorities for low income countries are to end corporate tax avoidance, reduce corruption and raise tax collections. These areas are far more important than aid inflows: The six countries under analysis are losing 6.4% – 12.9% of their GDP; In most cases, this amounts to more than the combined national health and education budgets, meaning that expenditure on these areas could more than double; Revenue losses are larger than aid in two of the six countries and over 60% of the amount of aid in a further three.

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How governments are failing on the right to education

How governments are failing on the right to education

Report for ActionAid (April 2017)

This report is based on findings from citizens’ education reports in Malawi, Mozambique, Tanzania and Nepal, where extensive research was conducted in schools. It assesses the extent to which children, especially girls, are accessing good quality primary education. The findings, while showing some positive progress, are extremely concerning. They show that:
• Governments are not investing enough to ensure a quality education for the next generation, and are largely failing in their duty to promote the right to education.
• Governments are also largely failing to meet the education commitments they have signed up to in international fora.
• The consequence is that few children are receiving a quality education. It is girls who often lose out most: girls are more likely to be victims of violence and abuse in school, often do less well in school examinations and are enduring extremely poor school sanitation facilities that are not conducive to a quality learning environment.

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Tanzania Citizens’ Education Report

Tanzania Citizens’ Education Report

Report for ActionAid (February 2017)

This Citizens’ Education Report identifies the extent to which Tanzania’s children, especially girls, are accessing good quality primary education, and recommends improvements, notably in government policies. It is based on extensive collaborative research among communities and school stakeholders in 30 schools in two districts, Kilwa and Singida.

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Nepal Citizens’ Education Report

Nepal Citizens’ Education Report

Report for ActionAid (February 2017)

This Citizen’s Education Report, witten with ActionAid Nepal, identifies the extent to which Nepal’s children, especially girls, are accessing good quality primary education, and recommends improvements, notably in government policies. It is based on extensive collaborative research among communities and school stakeholders in 25 project schools in two districts, Kailali and Doti, located in western Nepal. The task of improving primary education in Nepal is urgent since, as the research has found, few children are receiving a good quality education despite some progress in recent years.

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Domestic Tax and Education

Domestic Tax and Education

Report for ActionAid and International Commission on Financing Global Education (November 2016)

This report, part-written by Curtis Research, outlines how increased taxation in developing countries should fund public education. The task is urgent given that 121 million primary or lower secondary age children are out of school while 250 million children who are in school but not learning. Many tax incentives provided by developing country governments cause far more harm than good. First, and most importantly, they can massively reduce government revenues by removing the requirement for companies to pay fair levels of tax. Second, they can encourage corruption and secrecy when negotiated in highly discretionary ‘special deals’ with individual companies. Third, they mainly attract ‘footloose’ firms which move their investments from one country to another, and therefore do not encourage stable long term investments. Fourth, where they favour foreign investors, they can disadvantage domestic investors and deter them from entering markets or expanding. The ostensible reason for governments providing tax incentives to business is to attract foreign direct investment (FDI), yet the evidence suggests that tax incentives are not needed to attract FDI. There are four types of incentives that are particularly problematic: discretionary incentives, tax holidays, tax incentives in free trade zones and stability agreements. Developing countries are estimated to lose US$139 billion a year just from one form of tax incentive – corporate income tax exemptions. This could easily fill the annual global finance gap for basic education.

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