Online Breakfast-Debate with Jorge Ferreras Gutiérrez, Coordinating Counsellor for Finance at the Permanent Representation of Spain to the EU
On Friday October 1, 2021, the Official Spanish Chamber of Commerce in Belgium and Luxembourg organised a new virtual breakfast-debate within the cycle “Business Circle”, a meeting platform between Spanish companies and representatives in the European institutions. Jorge Ferreras Gutiérrez, Coordinating Counsellor for Finance of the Permanent Representation of Spain to the EU, took part in the debate.
The topic of the breakfast was “Business taxation in the European Union: The Communication of the European Commission on this matter and the implications of the recent agreements of the G20 and the OECD”.
The President of the Chamber and moderator of the event, Pablo López Álvarez, welcomed and briefly introduced the speaker, summarising his professional career. He also thanked all the attendees for their presence.
Jorge Ferreras Gutiérrez began his speech by contextualising the current situation of digital business taxation in the EU. To do so, he divided the issue into three basic questions: where do we come from, where are we now and where are we going.
On the first point, he pointed out the need to connect the decisions of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) with the initiatives of the European Commission for tackling the problem of base erosion and profit shifting (BEPS). In this regard, he highlighted that in 2013 the recommendations of both organisations were embodied in the so-called BEPS Action Plan, which includes 15 measures, focusing the first one on digital economy issues. Ferreras also mentioned the impossibility of separating the digital economy from the rest of the economic activity and how the difficulties of the first one make the problems of the economy as a whole to increase exponentially.
The speaker then detailed the implications for companies of the agreement reached in July 2021, based on two pillars: the redistribution of available profits and the establishment of effective taxation. On this point, he discussed the development of the negotiations between the Member States and their impact on the public debate.
Finally, the Coordinating Counsellor for Finance set out a number of challenges for the proposals to be presented in the course of the coming year and for achieving consensus between the European jurisdictions.
During the question and answer time, participants were able to express their doubts and comments on a number of issues of interest. Thus, issues such as the reasons for the lack of agreement with Ireland, the fiscal measures proposed by the European Commission to recover the funds of the Next Generation EU (NGEU), the percentage of the redistribution of profits that could correspond to Spain and how this new international regulation will affect Luxembourg were discussed.
From the Official Spanish Chamber of Commerce in Belgium and Luxembourg we would like to thank Jorge Ferreras Gutiérrez for his participation and all the attendees for their presence.
