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News from the European Commission and European Parliament – October 2016

By November 22, 2016July 10th, 2021No Comments

The European Commission has published VAT gap statistics for the year 2014. According to the figures, the total EU VAT gap amounted to €159.5 billion…

VAT Gap: Nearly €160 billion lost in uncollected revenues in the EU in 2014 – 6 September 2016

The European Commission has published VAT gap statistics for the year 2014. According to the figures, the total EU VAT gap amounted to €159.5 billion. Significant disparities, however, exist between Member States. In Sweden for example, only 1,2% of VAT was uncollected whilst in Romania the same figure was 37,9%. In absolute terms, the amount of uncollected VAT was lowest in Luxembourg, with €147 million, whilst Italy had the largest amount of VAT uncollected – €36.9 billion.

Source: http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_IP-16-2936_en.htm 

 

“Commission to cut VAT on e-books” – 10 September 2016

According to the Financial Times (article only available to subscribers), the Commission will amend the VAT Directive in order to provide for reduced rates currently applicable to paper-based publications for e-publications as well. The measure was already announced in the VAT Action Plan earlier this year but according to the article, Commissioner Moscovici stated that the proposal should be expected in “the weeks to come”. The date of 30 November has been circulating around.

Source: https://www.ft.com/content/5bba17d0-7743-11e6-a0c6-39e2633162d5

 

EU 27 finance ministers discuss tax in informal Bratislava Summit – 10 September 2016

The finance ministers of 27 EU Member States (UK not present) have held an informal Summit in Bratislava, Slovakia, to discuss major challenges faced by the EU, including the Brexit, migration and terrorism. The ministers also focused on taxation. According to a supplementary note posted for the ministers’ meeting, the tax discussion focused on how to improve tax certainty for companies notably through cooperative compliance, the effectiveness of tax administrations, improved exchange of information between tax authorities as well as tax authorities and other administrations, as well as the expected consultation on possible disclosure requirements for tax advisors (possibly as part of the Directive on Administrative Cooperation).

Source: http://src.bna.com/inB