Blog – Nuyts Professional

24/07/2023

Europe action brings concrete benefits for citizens and businesses and protects rule of law

The European Commission adopted this month its Annual Report on Monitoring the Application of EU Law. The report outlines the enforcement actions that the Commission took in 2022 to guarantee the protection of the rights and freedoms of people and businesses across the EU. The Commission also published its Single Market Scoreboard for 2022 enforcement data, outlining how well the Single Market is functioning and measuring performance per policy area and Member State.

The Commission also concluded a stocktaking exercise, identifying ways to further improve its working methods when it comes to the enforcement of EU law. Launched in 2022, the aim of the stocktaking exercise was to ensure that the best possible enforcement tools are available to make it work in practice. The Commission is now reporting on its outcome.

Finally, the Commission has adopted its regular package of decisions on infringements. Continue reading “Europe action brings concrete benefits for citizens and businesses and protects rule of law”

06/01/2023

Embracing the digital transition to help fight VAT fraud and support EU businesses

The European Commission today proposed a series of measures to modernise and make the EU’s Value-Added Tax (VAT) system work better for businesses and more resilient to fraud by embracing and promoting digitalisation. Today’s proposal also aims to address challenges in the area of VAT raised by the development of the platform economy.

Member States lost €93 billion in VAT revenues in 2020 according to the latest VAT Gap figures also published today. Conservative estimates suggest that one quarter of the missing revenues can be attributed directly to VAT fraud linked to intra-EU trade. These losses are clearly detrimental to overall public finances at a time when Member States are adjusting budgets to deal with the social and economic effects of recent energy price spikes and Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine. In addition, VAT arrangements in the EU can still be burdensome for businesses, especially for SMEs, and other companies who operate or are looking to scale-up cross-border. Continue reading “Embracing the digital transition to help fight VAT fraud and support EU businesses”

07/09/2022

International Procurement Instrument : Council gives green light to new rules promoting reciprocity

The Council adopted a regulation to promote reciprocity in access to international public procurement markets.

This legislative act will enable us to introduce a new trade policy tool to ensure access and a level playing field for EU companies on third countries’ public procurement markets, thereby increasing business opportunities for these companies. Public procurement currently accounts for 15 to 20% of global GDP.

The EU’s public procurement markets are among the largest worldwide in terms of value and are broadly open to competition. But European companies do not always have equal access to procurement markets in non-EU countries, where they are often subject to discriminatory restrictive practices. Fewer than half of the world’s public procurement markets are currently open to European companies. Continue reading “International Procurement Instrument : Council gives green light to new rules promoting reciprocity”