C 347/214
EN
Official Journal of the European Union
9.9.2022
Thursday 10 March 2022
initiative for introducing a common, standardised, Union-wide system for withholding tax relief at source, accompanied by an exchange of information and cooperation mechanism among tax authorities; calls on the Commission in this respect, and in response to the recent Cum-Ex revelations and the OECD/G20 global tax deal, to assess the potential benefits of a minimum effective withholding tax rate; calls on the Commission, in this respect, to relaunch the discussion on the blocked revision of the Council Directive 2003/49/EC (9) (Interest and Royalties Directive);
3.
Welcomes the Commission's proposal to modernise, simplify and harmonise VAT requirements, using transaction-based real-time reporting and e-invoicing; notes that such reporting needs to be taxpayer-friendly while allowing tax administrations to have an overview of the various transactions in real-time, facilitating the prevention and detection of fraud and risky economic operators; considers that reporting requirements and tax forms should converge across the Member States; believes that the use of the data-mining tool Transaction Network Analysis (TNA) represents one of the available options to reduce tax fraud and promotes its further development and sharing of best practices among Member States;
4.
Recalls that any tax measures, temporary or not, should avoid distorting investment decisions and should act as a tool in supporting the fulfilment of Union goals as outlined in Article 3(3) of the Treaty on European Union, including competitiveness of European businesses; stresses that the reporting requirements should not lead to a disproportionate increase in administrative costs for economic actors, notably for SMEs; notes that in order to effectively address lost tax revenues, better quality and possible higher quantities of data may be needed; insists on the principle that any data gathered by the tax authorities from taxpayers, in line with taxpayers’ rights, must be provided to the Member States only once, protected by the utmost security and respect for data protection laws; notes the potential of data and digital tools to reduce red tape and simplify various taxpayer obligations, in particular in the area of VAT returns and recapitulative statements, and notes that artificial intelligence (AI) and various software should be used to maximise the effectiveness of the use of data; expresses the need to continue efforts to increase administrative cooperation between Member States in order to reduce fraud and tax evasion; believes it is necessary not only to increase the quantity, but also to improve the quality, of the data exchanged, with a view to having a more efficient system;
5.
Underlines that the diversity of the Member States’ tax regulations constitutes a cumbersome challenge, particularly for SMEs and start-ups operating or willing to start trading in the single market, as they have to cope with up to 27 different tax systems; believes that due care should be devoted to higher compliance costs sustained by SMEs; stresses that SMEs should not be further penalised by the financial burden associated with operating under different national systems and the benefits of the single market should be easily accessible to them;
6.
Highlights that a sustainable recovery strategy should consider the sustainability of the ongoing low interest rates and the increase in inflation across the Union; considers that the tax burden should not move from capital gains to labour, as it does now; considers, in this regard, that more attention should be paid to the large number of mobile workers;
7.
Reiterates the importance of Next Generation EU funds for the economic recovery of the Union and highlights the opportunity to use the Recovery and Resilience Facility to pursue fiscal reforms and investments leading to a fairer, more sustainable and better digitalised fiscal system; recalls that the Fiscalis programme for the period 2021-2027, with a budget of EUR 269 million, aims to combat tax fraud and supports revenue collection for the Union and Member States' budgets by helping national tax authorities to cooperate better to combat tax fraud, tax evasion and aggressive tax planning;
8.
Takes note that the estimated revenue lost to international tax evasion by individuals was EUR 46 billion in 2016; observes the current distortions of the single market due to harmful tax practices that constitute harmful tax competition; notes that, as well as the Action Plan, a Communication from the Commission on Tax Good Governance in the EU and beyond was published focusing on the need to reform the EU Code of Conduct on Business Taxation and the criteria
(9)
Council Directive 2003/49/EC of 3 June 2003 on a common system of taxation applicable to interest and royalty payments made between associated companies of different Member States (OJ L 157, 26.6.2003, p. 49).