Margaret Hodge MP, Chair of the Public Accounts Committee has commented on SSE being awarded the Fair Tax Mark. She said:

I welcome SSE's commitment to being open and honest about its tax affairs. Too often companies hide behind commercial confidentiality to disguise their activities, claiming that transparency about their tax affairs would damage their competitiveness. I don't buy that, and the public don't buy that.

SSE clearly feels it has nothing to fear — and potentially a lot to gain - from responding to public demands for greater openness. There is no excuse for other companies not to do the same, and make this new standard in transparency the norm, not the exception.

This kind of information will enable we the public not only to see how much tax SSE is paying, but to make a meaningful assessment of whether this constitutes a fair and appropriate amount of tax relative to the profits it is making in the countries where it operates.

The key issue is, I think, in the middle paragraph. It's now for others to follow in SSE's path and become Fair Tax Mark accredited.