27 Amendments of Jonás FERNÁNDEZ related to 2015/2010(INL)
Amendment 1 #
Motion for a resolution
Citation 4 a (new)
Citation 4 a (new)
- Having regard to the OECD/G20 Final BEPS Project published on 5 October 2015,
Amendment 23 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital E
Recital E
E. whereas the investigations carried out under the TAXE Committee revealed that the practice of tax rulings does not exclusively take place in Luxembourg but is common across the Union; whereas the practice of tax rulings can be used legitimately to provide legal certainty for business, but is nevertheless open to potential abuse and tax avoidance; whereas regard is had to the report from the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) published on 12 February 2013 entitled ‘Addressing Base Erosion and Profit Shifting’ proposed new international standards to combat base erosion and profit shifting (BEPS); whereas regard is also had to the Communiqué issued following the Meeting of Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors of the G20 which took place on [to be inserted];
Amendment 28 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital E a (new)
Recital E a (new)
Ea. whereas, with some laudable exceptions, national political leaders have not been sufficiently forthcoming in addressing the problem of tax avoidance in corporate taxation;
Amendment 30 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital E b (new)
Recital E b (new)
Eb. whereas DG Competition and the European Commission have reacted late to the abuse of tax rulings, given that tax rulings have been used for no less than twenty years;
Amendment 33 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital F a (new)
Recital F a (new)
Fa. whereas the so-called tax competition among Member States is incompatible with the philosophy of an internal market in which resources are allocated in terms of productive and technological efficiency and comparative advantages;
Amendment 51 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital K a (new)
Recital K a (new)
Ka. whereas supply-side aggressive tax planning is incompatible with the principle of loyal cooperation among Member States;
Amendment 59 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital O
Recital O
Amendment 67 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital P
Recital P
P. whereas the lack of coordinated tax policies in the Union leads to significant cost and administrative burden for citizens and businesses operating cross-borderin more than one Member State within the Union, and results in unintended non-taxation or facilitates aggressive tax planning;
Amendment 74 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital Q a (new)
Recital Q a (new)
Qa. whereas corporate taxation should be guided by the principle of taxing profits where they are realized;
Amendment 77 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital R a (new)
Recital R a (new)
Ra. whereas corporate taxation should not be used to fuel a race to the bottom by Member States;
Amendment 78 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital R b (new)
Recital R b (new)
Rb. whereas the Union should strive to eliminate the gap between high deducibility of commercial expenditures and investments in a given Member State, and low taxation of profits in a another Member State or third jurisdiction;
Amendment 79 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital R c (new)
Recital R c (new)
Rc. whereas tax avoidance and aggressive tax planning is facilitated by tax havens;
Amendment 80 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital R d (new)
Recital R d (new)
Rd. whereas trade, travel and political sanctions should be applied to uncooperative jurisdictions in the fight against tax evasion and avoidance;
Amendment 109 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital T – point iv a (new)
Recital T – point iv a (new)
(iva) whereas the European Commission or one of its agencies should elaborate a public black list of tax havens based on objective criteria;
Amendment 110 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital T – point iv b (new)
Recital T – point iv b (new)
(ivb) whereas the objective criteria for the inclusion of the said public black list of tax havens should be the conduct of any of the following practices: a) Aggressively low or non-existent corporate taxation; b) Granting tax benefits to non-residents that conduct no substantial economic activity in the jurisdiction; c) Lack of automatic exchange of information on tax payers and tax rulings; d) Engaging in secret tax rulings; e) Lack of ad-hoc of administrative and judicial cooperation on tax evasion and tax avoidance files; f) Legal bank secrecy; g) Legal persecution of whistle-blowers; h) Active cooperation of government officials in designing legal or illegal schemes for tax avoidance or evasion; i) Any other government practice conducive to helping and abetting tax fraud, tax evasion and tax avoidance;
Amendment 111 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital T – point iv c (new)
Recital T – point iv c (new)
(ivc) whereas the European Commission or one of its agencies should elaborate a public black list of corporate tax evaders and avoiders;
Amendment 113 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital T – point v a (new)
Recital T – point v a (new)
(va) whereas the conduct of aggressive tax planning by corporations is incompatible with Social Corporate Responsibility, and as such it should be highlighted by the institutions devoted to monitor it;
Amendment 117 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital T – point vi
Recital T – point vi
(vi) whereas progress in the fight against tax evasion and avoidance and aggressive tax planning can only be monitored with a harmonised methodology that can be used to estimate the size of the direct and indirect tax gaps in all Member States, and across the Union as a whole;
Amendment 123 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital T – point vii
Recital T – point vii
(vii) whereas the current Union-wide legal framework to protect whistleblowers is insufficient, and there exists significant variation between the ways in which different Member States provide protection for whistleblowers; whereas in the absence of such protection, those employees who hold vital information will understandably be reluctant to come forward and therefore that information will not be made available; whereas since whistleblowers helped to mobilise public attention on the issue of unfair taxation, Member States should consider measures that will protect such activity; whereas it would therefore be appropriate to offer Union-wide protection for whistleblowers who report suspected misconduct, wrongdoing, fraud or illegal activity to national regulators or, in cases of persistently unaddressed illegal activity that could affect the public interest, to the public as a whole; whereas such protection should be coherent with the overall legal system; whereas Member States shall decriminalize the revelation by whistleblowers of corporate information in the cases of suspected misconduct, wrongdoing, fraud or illegal activity;
Amendment 129 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital U – introductory part
Recital U – introductory part
U. whereas Member States have the power to legislate on corporate taxation is vested in the Member States, yet the vast majority of problems linked to aggressive tax planning are of a multinational nature; whereas more coordination of national tax policies therefore represents the only feasible way to address the problems of BEPS and aggressive tax planning;
Amendment 142 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital U – point i a (new)
Recital U – point i a (new)
(ia) whereas CCCTB should be complemented in the medium term with a minimum Union corporate tax rate, which will be instrumental in reducing the incentives for the seeking of tax rulings and abusive transfer price mechanisms;
Amendment 143 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital U – point i b (new)
Recital U – point i b (new)
(ib) whereas the new CCCTB initiative launched by the Commission should include a short deadline regarding the consolidation element, which is key to solve the problem of transfer mispricing;
Amendment 144 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital U – point i c (new)
Recital U – point i c (new)
(ic) whereas a fraction of a CCCTB should become an own resource of the European Union, given that companies are the ones that benefit the most from the functioning of the internal market;
Amendment 167 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital U – point ix a (new)
Recital U – point ix a (new)
(ixa) whereas effective tax corporate coordination requires setting up a European Tax Agency as an independent agency of the European Commission;
Amendment 169 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital U – point ix b (new)
Recital U – point ix b (new)
Amendment 176 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital V – introductory part
Recital V – introductory part
V. whereas improved coordination alone will not solve fundamental problems arising from the fact that different rules regarding corporate taxation exist in different Member States; whereas part of the overall response to aggressive tax planning must involve the convergence of a limited number of national tax practices; whereas this can be achieved while still preserving the sovereigntyrespecting the competencies of Member States in relation to other elements of their corporate tax systems;
Amendment 210 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital X a (new)
Recital X a (new)
Xa. whereas the unanimity requirement included in Article 113 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union makes it extremely difficult to make progress on tax matters, it is necessary to reform it so decisions can be taken by qualified majority vote in the Council and in co-decision with the European Parliament;