The meeting of national experts of the EU Council on Thursday 24 January failed to make significant progress on the proposal for country-by-country tax transparency ('reporting'), which would require companies to make public certain accounting data such as their turnover, profits or taxes paid (see EUROPE 11530), according to one European source.
The objective was to reconfirm the positions of the Member States, since the last working group meeting was held in June 2018 (see EUROPE 12041), a diplomatic source told us earlier this week.
However, the round table did not allow the Romanian Presidency of the Council to note that the file was mature enough to be forwarded to the Permanent Representatives Committee (Coreper).
The meeting, however, reportedly ended with an invitation to the Council's Legal Service to check whether its opinion on the legal basis, dated November 2016 (see EUROPE 11667), was still valid in view of the changes in the text currently on the table (see EUROPE 12175).
The Council's lawyers had concluded that the legal basis chosen by the Commission, which opens the way to co-decision, was not adequate and indicated that it was necessary to revert to a proposal based on Article 115 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the EU, which stipulates unanimity in the Council. The question still divides the Member States (see EUROPE 11758). However, in order to agree on a change of legal basis, unanimity is required. (Original version in French by Marion Fontana)