Lídia Pereira (EPP, Portugal), alternate rapporteur on the impact of national tax reforms on the EU economy, urged the European Commission to play its role as a coordinator as part of the European Parliament plenary session on Monday 14 February.
In fact, the report by Markus Ferber (EPP, Germany) shows that countries that overburden their taxpayers are more reluctant to implement employment-friendly reforms.
While the EU Council has expressed its readiness to implement international tax reform, following an agreement made with the OECD (see EUROPE 12871/2), “this coordinating role is key within the context of an open internal market”, emphasised Pereira.
“When tax policies are poorly coordinated, small and medium-sized enterprises are the first victims since they cannot afford to have extensive legal or compliance services such as those required as a result of the complexity of 27 different systems”, she added, concluding that “poor coordination also opens the door to opportunities for fraud, evasion or aggressive tax planning”.
In her opinion, and on behalf of the European Commission, Commissioner for Energy Kadri Simson confirmed that tax fragmentation represents a risk to the internal market. Furthermore, she gave assurances that the European Commission wants the international tax reform to become a reality in 2023. The proposal for a directive to transpose Pillar I of the OECD agreement on digital taxation in the EU is still under discussion in the EU Council.
The Commissioner welcomed the work of MEPs on the report, saying that it “goes into more depth to rectify the problems that might exist”.
The results of the final vote on the report are expected on Wednesday 16 February since no amendments have been tabled for the plenary.
To read the draft report: https://bit.ly/3gL8Kb6 (Original version in French by Anne Damiani)