The selection of former Dutch finance minister Wopke Hoekstra to go EU tax coverage has attracted scrutiny from MEPs, given his previous hyperlinks to tax havens and the Netherlands’ standing as a hub for company tax avoidance.
Influential left-wing MEPs within the European Parliament are elevating issues in regards to the suitability of Dutchman Wopke Hoekstra to function tax commissioner for the following 5 years.
In 2021, the Paradise Papers leak revealed that Hoekstra, who has been the EU’s local weather commissioner since final October, had invested €26,500 in a safari firm in East Africa by way of the British Virgin Islands. He offered the shares every week earlier than turning into minister in 2017 and later advised the Dutch parliament that he ought to have been extra cautious.
Brussels can also be investigating alleged favorable tax remedy by the Netherlands of multinationals comparable to Starbucks, Ikea and Nike, which occurred earlier than and through Hoekstra’s tenure as finance minister.
“It sends the fallacious message to residents if somebody who has invested in tax havens is now combating tax evasion,” Pasquale Tridico (Italy/The Left), chairman of the parliament’s tax committee, advised Euronews, including that Hoekstra wouldn’t be credible within the position.
Tridico, who chairs the Parliament’s tax committee, has referred to as on Commission President Ursula von der Leyen to vary her portfolio, which additionally consists of local weather and clear development. If she does not, he predicts a troublesome future for the Dutchman.
“His capacity to advocate for truthful taxation is undermined by his look within the Pandora Papers because the proprietor of a shell firm in a tax haven,” MEP Matthias Ecke (Germany/S&D), one of many 4 vice-chairs of the tax committee, advised Euronews.
Tridico and Ecke are among the many MEPs more likely to play a key position in conducting Hoekstra’s listening to on the European Parliament, throughout which MEPs will query the commissioner candidates on their suitability and conflicts of curiosity.
In precept, MEPs can vote to reject the complete Commission, which incorporates one senior official from every of the EU’s 27 member states. In apply, a forewarned von der Leyen would probably swap candidates or shuffle portfolios to stop that from taking place.
The opposition would most likely be of explicit concern to von der Leyen if it got here from the events that had beforehand supported her, together with Ecke’s Socialists, the Greens or the liberal Renew group.
Other candidates for the position of commissioner, comparable to Italy’s Raffaele Fitto and Hungary’s Olivér Várhelyi, may additionally find yourself in MEPs’ sights, given their right-wing affiliations and turbulent careers.
Ecke harassed that MEPs will fastidiously study Hoekstra’s tax plans and his previous. “Only an formidable program on truthful taxation may dispel present doubts about his suitability for the tax portfolio,” he added.
Others seem optimistic in regards to the prospects of his time period, which unusually combines fiscal and local weather coverage.
Hoekstra “has a beautiful alternative to hyperlink local weather change to financial inequality by proposing fiscal measures,” stated MEP Kira Marie Peter-Hansen (Denmark/Greens), noting that the richest 1% are accountable for extra carbon emissions than the poorest 66%.
A mission letter despatched to Hoekstra final week by von der Leyen asks him to make use of taxes to advertise clear applied sciences.
It will even need to implement an present worldwide tax reform, “be sure that Europe maintains the very best degree of ambition” within the struggle towards fraud and tax avoidance, and drive present company tax reform plans, though these legal guidelines are inclined to progress slowly as any single member state can veto them.
