Netflix drama on Brazil corruption mega-scandal, The Mechanism, Starts on Netflix - The True Cost of Car Wash

"The true cost of Car Wash is so much bigger than the eye-watering sums actually stolen," said Ed Davey, investigative journalist at Global Witness.

"White collar crime is anything but victimless. The looted funds could have paid for the salaries of a million nurses, saving countless lives, or funded a year's education for over 17 million children. And the knock-on effect on the economy went far BEYOND this, helping to bring about Brazil's worst recession since records began."

The Mechanism, from the creators of Narcos, is released on 23rd March. It tells the story of how Brazilian police UNCOVERED a racket involving the state oil company Petrobras that implicated 20 political parties, 28 major corporations and has resulted in more than 100 convictions so far. Former left-wing president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva is appealing a twelve-year bribery sentence, while current right-wing president Michel Temer has also been fighting off corruption charges.

If withdrawn in ten pound notes, the sum embezzled - much of which was laundered in cash - would make a stack eight miles high, equivalent to 16 Burj Khalifas (the tallest building on earth) . The 119 tonnes of banknotes would take a fleet of 97 Ford Transit vans to deliver.

But a new analysis by Global Witness reveals the SCANDAL may have cost the Brazilian people vastly more money than was actually stolen. The fallout from the SCANDAL reduced Brazil's GDP by an astonishing 3.6% in 2015, 2016 and 2017, according to leading firm of Sao Paulo consultants GO Associados. That would imply a total loss of $13.8 billion (£9.9 billion) in lost tax revenues. Furthermore, while it was mired in the scandal, Petrobras did not pay the Brazilian government a dividend for three years - depriving the country's hard-pressed public services of a further $1.5 billion (£1.1 billion). The total of £11 billion in lost taxes would have paid for more than a million nurses in a country where universal healthcare is some way off - or educated more than 17 million primary school children for a year.

If one considers capital losses too, the picture is bleaker still. Petrobras's share price has dropped by more than 25% - a paper loss of £14.1 billion.

José Padilha, writer and director of NARCOS and The Mechanism (himself a Brazilian), said: "I feel disgust and exasperation. Too many Brazilians fall into the trap of ideology, but this mechanism has no ideology.

"In my country you can turn any stone and there will be cockroaches underneath. Democracy has failed."

The Mechanism. Season One of the series begins on 23rd March. https://www.netflix.com/title/80120485

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