Evelyn Regner
Numerous tax scandals, such as the Panama Papers, Lux Leaks and latterly Open Lux, have demonstrated how easy it is for large corporations to circumvent national tax laws. To avoid their tax obligations or reporting requirements, multinational enterprises (MNEs) create shell companies or corporate structures with which they operate in several European Union member states or even worldwide. MNEs appear simply to choose the country with the most favourable tax system, social-security arrangements or worker-protection standards in which to conduct their business.
To curb these practices, several years ago the Socialists and Democrats in the European Parliament (successfully) put a proposal on public country-by-country Reporting (pCBCR) on the table of the parliament’s Legal Affairs Committee. The European Commission responded in 2016 with a proposed directive on pCBCR.