Brussels, 19/04/2001 (Agence Europe) - The EU Finance Ministers will begin their informal meeting in Malmö on Friday (see EUROPE of 13 April, p.9) with an exchange of views on the future priorities of the EU concerning taxation policy. The debate, held in the presence of Commission President Romano Prodi, will be largely fuelled by a document presented in February by Commissioner Frits Bolkestein. The document will serve as a basis for a communication that the Commission is to adopt in May or June (see EUROPE of 8 February, p.8). Two questions will be tackled: 1) at the procedural level, the Swedish Presidency should support the creation of a high level expert group; 2) regarding substance, it would be a question of determining new priorities to be fixed. On this last point, the approach by Mr Bolkestein has already given rise to a debate within the Commission, during which Pascal Lamy clearly distanced himself from his colleague. Mr Bolkestein believes tax competition is necessary, as long as the principles of the Single Market are respected. For others, and Mr Lamy in particular, the completion of the Single Market should take the road to harmonisation. "This divergence should reoccur within the Ecofin", said the French diplomat, who considers Mr Bolkestein does not raise the true question of substance in his document: Can one live without taxing mobile production factors (capital, labour …)? What can one do when countries such as Ireland have a corporate taxation rate of between 10 and 15%, while others practice a rate close to 40% or a candidate country has a zero rate?.