German
Bundestag, Plenarprotokoll 19/183, 23036-23037.
Herr
President. Right honorable ladies and gentlemen.
The
Convention spoken of was reached in November 2016 by 100 states and by June
2017 finally signed by Germany and 67 other states. It contains important
points of an action plan of the OECD and the G-20 states to prevent the
displacement of profits between states for tax purposes.
What
now shall have been achieved by this Convention? The declared goal is the
prevention of the purposeful exploitation of existing treaty regulations by
multinational corporations. Was this goal achieved? Unfortunately not. Why then
does the Convention, which after all consists of around 80 pages, remain ineffective,
despite all the praise of the finance ministers?
First.
The Convention increases the complexity of international tax law and to a
considerable extent removes legal security, a circumstance which has been
clearly confirmed by experts. In that regard, only very insufficiently
regulated is dispute resolution, which especially for Germans is
extraordinarily complicated and unsatisfactory.
Second.
The agreement should lead to the numerous double taxation agreements – which for
Germany alone are around 100 in all – in a briefer time being able to be efficiently
adapted into the framework of a treaty network. Unfortunately, also here there
is no success: For three years we await the implementation. Remaining are only
14 treaty states to be included in the Convention. All other states must be
negotiated with bilaterally, as previously.
One
reason for this meagre return is the fact that only those treaty states which
themselves select Germany as a treaty state fall under the agreement. The result
will be even more insufficient when it is considered that each treaty state
must recognize the identical clauses of the state with which it is contracting.
Third
and most important: The Convention ignores the core of the problem; since there
are states which, to increase their economic attraction, offer special tax incentives
so that firms may establish themselves there, frequently in the form of so-called
patent boxes. Thereby can large firms, for example, American concerns, minimize
their tax burden. That is a matter of intense activity – with and within the
EU. Here to some extent will be offered adventurously low tax rates which make
a mockery of the media-hyped expressions of European unity and solidarity.
France
offers patent box firms a tax rate of 10 percent, Spain 8 percent, the
Netherlands 7, Ireland 6 and Belgium 4 percent. And what is Germany’s relation
to this? For us, it is certainly not a solution. It has to do, after all, with research-intensive
firms. We generally have no comparable landscape.
Yet,
binding arrangements with local tax authorities, so-called tax rulings, which
generally do not occur here, are also a problem. As in Ireland: There, Apple,
as you all know, according to a tax ruling pays .005 percent tax on its profits
and thereby, in relation to the regular tax rate, is spared 13 billion euros in
taxes. For years, this problem has been acknowledged within the EU; a solution
is not in sight.
We
thus come to the conclusion that many repeals will be made of measures which
promote legal insecurity and complexity while problems capable of solution in
the vicinity of and within the EU will generally not be approached. Therefore,
right honorable ladies and gentlemen, with all acknowledgment of the good
intentions but in regards the bad implementation, we abstain from voting.
Hearty
thanks.
[trans: tem]
