Regulation (EC) No 2516/2000 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 7 November 2000 modifying the common principles of the European system of national and regional accounts in the Community (ESA) 95 as concerns taxes and social contributions and amending Council Regulation (EC) No 2223/96
Date: 2000-11-07
Institutions: Council of the European Union, European Parliament
Subjects: EU statistics, European accounting system, Eurostat, financial statistics, social-security contribution, tax

17.11.2000

EN

Official Journal of the European Communities

L 290/1

I

(Acts whose publication is obligatory)

REGULATION (EC) No 2516/2000 OF THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT AND OF THE COUNCIL

of 7 November 2000

modifying the common principles of the European system of national and regional accounts in the
Community (ESA) 95 as concerns taxes and social contributions and amending Council Regulation
(EC) No 2223/96

THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT AND THE COUNCIL OF THE
EUROPEAN UNION,

government sector as defined in the European system of
integrated economic accounts (ESA).

Having regard to the Treaty establishing the European
Community, and in particular Article 285 thereof,

(5)

Having regard to the proposal from the Commission (1),

Having regard to the opinion of the Economic and Social
Committee (2),

Acting in accordance with the procedure laid down in Article
251 of the Treaty (3),

Whereas:

Council Regulation (EC) No 2223/96 of 25 June 1996
on the European system of national and regional
accounts in the Community (4) (ESA 95) contains the
reference framework of common standards, definitions,
classifications and accounting rules for drawing up the
accounts of the Member States for the statistical require-
ments of the Community, in order to obtain comparable
results between Member States.

Article 2 of Regulation (EC) No 2223/96 sets out the
conditions under which the Commission may adopt
amendments to the ESA 95 methodology which are
intended to clarify and improve its content.

is

therefore necessary to refer

It
the clarifications
concerning the recording of taxes and social contribu-
tions in ESA 95 to the European Parliament and to the
Council as these clarifications modify basic concepts.

(1)

(2)

(3)

(4)

Euratom (5),

The Statistical Programme Committee (SPC), set up by
89/382/EEC,
Council Decision
the
Committee on Monetary, Financial and Balance of
Payments Statistics (CMFB), set up by Council Decision
91/115/EEC (6),
Product
Committee (GNP Committee) can state their opinion on
the country-specific accounting treatment of taxes and
social contributions whenever they consider it relevant.

the Gross National

and

(6)

(7)

The SPC and the CMFB have been consulted.

The measures necessary for the implementation of Regu-
lation (EC) No 2223/96 should be adopted in accord-
ance with Council Decision 1999/468/EC of 28 June
1999 laying down the procedures for the exercise of
implementing powers conferred on the Commission (7),

HAVE ADOPTED THIS REGULATION:

Article 1

Purpose

The purpose of this Regulation is to modify the common
principles of ESA 95 as concerns taxes and social contributions
so as to ensure comparability and transparency among the
Member States.

Article 2 of the protocol on the excessive deficit proce-
dure relating to Article 104 of the Treaty states that the
government deficit means net borrowing of the general

Article 2

General principles

(1) OJ C 21 E, 25.1.2000, p. 68.
(2) OJ C 75, 15.3.2000, p. 19.
(3) Opinion of

the European Parliament of 13 April 2000 (not yet
published in the Official Journal), Council Common Position of 26
June 2000 (OJ C 245, 25.8.2000, p. 1) and Decision of
the
European Parliament of 3 October 2000 (not yet published in the
Official Journal).

(4) OJ L 310, 30.11.1996, p. 1. Regulation as amended by Regulation

The impact on the net lending/borrowing of general govern-
ment of taxes and social contributions recorded in the system
shall not include amounts unlikely to be collected.

(5) OJ L 181, 28.6.1989, p. 47.
(6) OJ L 59, 6.3.1991, p. 19. Decision as amended by Decision 96/

174/EC (OJ L 51, 1.3.1996, p. 48).

(EC) No 448/98 (OJ L 58, 27.2.1998, p. 1).

(7) OJ L 184, 17.7.1999, p. 23.

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Official Journal of the European Communities

17.11.2000

Accordingly, the impact on general government net lending/
borrowing of taxes and social contributions recorded in the
system on an accrual basis shall be equivalent over a reasonable
amount of
time to the corresponding amounts actually
received.

Article 3

Treatment of

taxes and social contributions

in the

accounts

Taxes and social contributions recorded in the accounts may be
derived from two sources: amounts evidenced by assessments
and declarations or cash receipts.

(a) If assessments and declarations are used, the amounts shall
be adjusted by a coefficient reflecting assessed and declared
amounts never collected. As an alternative treatment, a
capital transfer to the relevant sectors could be recorded
equal to the same adjustment. The coefficients shall be
estimated on the basis of past experience and current
expectations in respect of assessed and declared amounts
never collected. They shall be specific to different types of
taxes and social contributions. The determination of these
coefficients shall be country-specific,
the method being
cleared with the Commission (Eurostat) beforehand.

(b) If cash receipts are used, they shall be time-adjusted so that
the cash is attributed when the activity took place to
generate the tax liability (or when the amount of tax was
determined, in the case of some income taxes). This adjust-
ment may be based on the average time difference between
the activity (or the determination of the amount of tax) and
cash tax receipt.

Article 4

Verification

1.
The Commission (Eurostat) shall verify the implementa-
tion by Member States of the principles laid down in this
Regulation.

2.
From 2000 onwards, Member States shall provide the
Commission (Eurostat) before the end of each year with a
detailed description of the methods they plan to use for the
different categories of taxes and social contributions in order to
implement this Regulation.

The methods applied and the possible revisions shall be
3.
subject to agreement between each Member State concerned
and the Commission (Eurostat).

4.
The Commission (Eurostat) shall keep the SPC, the CMFB
and the GNP Committee informed of the methods and the
calculation of the aforementioned coefficients.

Article 5

Implementation

Within 6 months of
the
the adoption of
Commission shall introduce in the text of Annex A to Regula-
tion (EC) No 2223/96, pursuant to the procedure in Article 4
thereof, the changes needed for the application of this Regula-
tion.

this Regulation,

Article 6

Committee procedure

Article 4 of Regulation (EC) No 2223/96 shall be replaced by
the following:

‘Article 4

The Commission shall be assisted by the Statistical
referred to as “the

1.
Programme Committee (hereinafter
Committee”).

2. Where reference is made to this Article, Articles 4
and 7 of Decision 1999/468/EC shall apply, having regard
to the provisions of Article 8 thereof.

The period laid down in Article 4(3) of Decision 1999/
468/EC shall be set at three months.

3.

The Committee shall adopt its rules of procedure.’

Article 7

Entry into force

1.
This Regulation shall enter into force on the twentieth
day following that of its publication in the Official Journal of the
European Communities.

2. Member States may ask the Commission for a transitional
period of no more than two years in which to bring their
accounting systems into line with this Regulation.

This Regulation shall be binding in its entirety and directly applicable in all Member States.

Done at Brussels, 7 November 2000.

For the European Parliament

The President

N. FONTAINE

For the Council

The President

L. FABIUS