Role and functioning of certain EU groups in the area of taxation : in-depth analysis

This paper forms part of a series of analytical pieces on the absence of EU-coordination regarding aggressive tax planning and its effects, prepared by Policy Department A at the request of the ECON Committee of the European Parliament. It deals with recent EU initiatives on tax issues on the fight against tax avoidance and aggressive tax planning. Many EU Groups can contribute to the realisation of this work in progress, because of their different priorities. This paper overviews the history, set-up, working methods and results of three EU Groups, i.e. the Council Code of Conduct Group on Harmful Business Taxation, the EU Joint Transfer Pricing Forum Expert Group and the Commission Expert Group on Automatic Exchange of Financial Account Information. Finally, the interaction between these Groups is discussed.