The revision of the directives on excise duties and their general arrangements applicable to tobacco and tobacco products will not harmonise taxation rules on tobacco for oral use, but rather those for nicotine sachets, confirmed Piotr Serafin, European Commissioner for the Budget, in a written reply published on Tuesday 16 September.
As a result, these pouches will fall within the scope of the directive and will be taken into account in calculating the own resource base from excise duties on tobacco, according to the Commission’s proposal presented in July (see EUROPE 13683/15) at the request of sixteen Member States (see EUROPE 13541/13).
Furthermore, “for a matter of equal treatment of Member States aiming at a fair collection of the Tobacco Excise Duty Own Resource, without pre-empting the result of the ongoing negotiations, the Commission has no intention to propose any exemption to Member States for the application of the Directive and the collection of the related own resource”, emphasised Mr Serafin.
In July, the three Swedish ECR MEPs Charlie Weimers, Dick Erixon and Beatrice Timgren voiced their concerns about the taxation of snus and nicotine sachets. “Sweden is exempt from this ban because of the cultural and historical importance of this product”, they pointed out in their question.
However, nicotine sachets do not contain tobacco and are therefore not covered by the exemption stipulated in Sweden’s EU Accession Treaty.
To read the answer: https://aeur.eu/f/ih5 (Original version in French by Anne Damiani)