Shell Profits, Cost of Living Crisis and the Need for New Forms of Taxation

That the Parliament is deeply concerned by the recent announcement by Shell of its profits for 2022 Q3, which increased to $9.5 billion, in the midst of what it believes is widely accepted as an unprecedented cost of living crisis; notes the increase of 131.7% on 2021 Q3’s profits of $4.1 billion; understands that this is Shell’s second-highest quarterly profit on record, second only to the previous quarter, which saw a profit of $11.5 billion; believes that this news paints a worrying picture of what it considers to be company profiteering on the backs of people, across the country, who are already facing the greatest increase in living costs in almost three decades; echoes the reported calls from Trades Unions Congress and across civic society and calls on the UK Government to implement a windfall tax on companies that have benefited from increases to profits at the expense, it believes, of consumers, in order to mitigate what it sees as the worst of skyrocketing energy bills; calls on the Scottish Government to review the use of existing tax powers to secure finances needed to support vulnerable people and protect what it considers already decimated public service budgets from further cuts, and insists that the Scottish Government must explore alternative taxation methods, such as land value tax and wealth tax, to ensure that the cost of this crisis does not land on the shoulders of those it considers least responsible and most affected by its impact.