Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2010-02-08-Speech-1-116"
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"en.20100208.14.1-116"2
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"Mr President, these proposals represent excellent efforts to facilitate the fight against tax fraud and improve cooperation between authorities.
We would do well to remember that taxation is never an end in itself, but is society’s tool for implementing politically agreed objectives, including the equalisation of income distribution, the taxation of harmful practices, and the creation of an economic basis for common welfare services. A good tax system relies on a fair and broad tax base and reasonable levels of taxation.
Tax evasion and tax fraud eat away at the tax base and honest citizens and companies are left to foot the bill for the taxes that fraudsters avoid paying. As we have heard here, gross domestic product is now at crisis point in different parts of Europe. Tax fraud and evasion result in poorer GDP results to the tune of around EUR 200 billion a year. We really cannot afford this.
I would like to make a few comments about the reports themselves. When ways to combat VAT fraud are being considered, the notions of cost benefit, legal certainty and the proportionality principle need to be borne in mind. These are highlighted very obviously in Mr Casa’s report. It is reasonable to focus, in particular, on goods and services that are susceptible to fraud in the fight against VAT fraud, and the reverse charge mechanism gives these Member States an opportunity to apply a reverse order arrangement, by way of derogation from the main principle of the VAT Directive.
Administrative cooperation is a way to supplement national legislations, but we need to remember that it will never replace them or result in their approximation.
Most controversial of all with respect to these directives has been the matter of information exchange. Effective information exchange between the customs and tax authorities in the Member States helps to combat abuse, and that is why I think that we should be promoting the exchange of tax records and not blocking it. In Finland, tax records are public knowledge and the country is one of the least corrupt in the world. This being the case, I cannot see how the automatic exchange of tax records might threaten to violate civil rights in the way some of my fellow Members seem to think it would."@en1
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