Speech on Council Conclusions (Country by Country Reporting), by Sharon Bowles MEP
"Parliament has consistently drawn attention to tax avoidance and fraud since my report in 2008 and that of Benoit Hamon on savings taxation in 2009. Despite this, and despite ambitious G20 statements after the Pittsburgh Summit in 2009, practically nothing happened in the EU. Indeed, most of the driving has come from the US.
"Through FATCA, Member States are yielding information to the US that we don't have ourselves.
"Following the Dodd-Frank Act in the US, we have agreed Country by Country Reporting for extractive and logging industries. But we do not know what is going on at all with the way profits are allocated and taxed in the EU.
"The promise then of 'Country by Country Reporting by large companies and groups' from the Council is welcome. It is a shame it comes just as the Accounting and Transparency Directives have been agreed, in the face of massive resistance from Council on broad scope Country by Country Reporting.
"With something like 1 trillion Euros at stake and revelations about large companies across all sectors paying very little tax in the EU despite large earnings it is time to find out what's going on.
"If big business pays no tax it is competing unfairly with local businesses that do pay tax. Has there been an analysis of how stifling that is to the growth of European small businesses? The argument that it can be tolerated for the jobs and income tax that might otherwise not be there is wrong. It is cheating European growth.
"We know developing countries have been exploited. Now realisation has dawned that maybe every country and every taxpayer is being exploited. Commissioner Barnier says he wants something solid, quickly. I want Council's assurance that it will be done in this mandate - no mucking around with delaying tactics or asking for Parliament concessions in return because this is not a unanimity file, it's a co-legislative file.
"It's a pity that we can't change the Accountancy and Transparency Directives because I fear what you might ask in return in those. So we have to put a financial reporting chapter into a non-financial reporting directive but make no mistake, it has to be financial reporting, it is in the Accountancy and Transparancy Directives, it has to be legally enforceable, and it has to be in this mandate otherwise it is just a false promise."
ENDS