In a surprise move, European Commission President José Manuel Barroso personally joined the combat the Union is trying to lead against tax evasion, on 28 September.
"It is not only financial institutions who should pay a fair share" of the costs of the financial crisis, he declared during his 'State of the Union' address to the European Parliament in Strasbourg. "We cannot afford to turn a blind eye to tax evasion."
Barroso hammered out the message that "it is time" for the 27 member states to agree on revision of the EU's savings taxation directive
Good news, and undoubtedly aimed at the UK and Germany - as well as at Luxembourg and Austria who are deliberately promoting tax evasion through their tax systems right now - just like the Swiss continue to do despite deals with the UK and Germany.
It's mood music I know.
But it's important mood music none the less.
Thanks for reading this post.
You can share this post on social media of your choice by clicking these icons:
You can subscribe to this blog's daily email here.
And if you would like to support this blog you can, here:
I just hope the USA could come onboard with this.
Oh dear, no chance with the Wall Street lobby.
We also need a way to handle Switzerland and other tax havens who would never agree.
A good way to start would be for the Commission to stop demanding things, like automatic exchange of information, that certain member states will never agree to.
And so endorse tax evasion – as you do, constantly? Is that what you want government to do?
It is not endorsing tax evasion at all. Luxembourg and Austria have offered to apply very strict withholding systems.
In the real world, this is the only regime that is likely to be adopted.
And those regimes facilitate tax evasion
It’s the only economic rationale for them
And you know it