EU vows sanctions on tax havens
brussels — The days in paradise may be numbered for those seeking refuge from heavy tax burdens in remote islands. Finance ministers representing the world’s largest market vowed to take action following the leak of records exposing prominent members of the global business A-list.
“I am fully determined to reinforce the means to fight tax evasion,” French Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire said before a meeting with his European Union counterparts in Brussels on Tuesday. “States have to stick to their commitments. If they don’t stick to
I am fully determined to reinforce the means to fight tax evasion... States have to stick to their commitments. If they don’t stick to their commitments we have to put sanctions
Bruno Le Maire, French finance minister
their commitments we have to put sanctions,” he said, adding that France will table a proposal to punish tax havens, which includes cutting international funding.
A new set of data taken from an offshore law firm exposed again this week the hidden wealth of individuals and shows how corporations, hedge funds and investors may have skirted taxes. A year after the Panama Papers, this new massive leak of confidential information from the Bermuda law firm Appleby Group Services Ltd has shone another light on the use of offshore accounts.
“We will examine the new documents and will discuss the consequences this has for upcoming EU legislation,” acting German Finance Minister Peter Altmaier said on Monday. “We will take a very close look at this,” he said, referring to the so-called Paradise Papers reports by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists and partner news outlets.
The EU has been working on finalising a so-called blacklist of uncooperative tax jurisdictions by the end of the year. This list of tax havens will be discussed at a meeting of the bloc’s finance ministers on Tuesday. While the discussion was originally planned for the ministers’ December meeting, the matter was put on the agenda following the Paradise Papers revelations.
“A black list is always a difficult exercise,” Luxembourg’s Finance Minister Pierre Gramegna said on his way into the meeting on Tuesday. “It’s an EU initiative that we have to agree together and we stand behind this idea.”
A common list will set out all the jurisdictions the bloc’s countries essentially deem to be tax havens. — Bloomberg