Despite striking its own favourable tax deals with Starbucks and others, the Netherlands says it will kerb tax avoidance schemes when it acquires the six-month presidency role.
The country’s finance minister, Jeroen Dijsselbloem, said the Netherlands wants to progress the clamp down on corporate tax avoidance during its EU presidency.
The Netherlands has dual tax treaties with nearly 100 countries that lower tax rates on profit, royalties and withholding tax.
This system has allowed some corporations to pay almost no tax and that was never the intention, Dijsselbloem said on Monday.
His comments followed European Commission criticism of its tax deal with the US coffee shop chain Starbucks, saying it amounted to illegal state aid.
Last month the Commission decided that the Netherlands must recover from Starbucks between €20 million to €30 million owed to it in back taxes.
The Netherlands assumes the six-month rotating EU presidency in January.
It said it is “motivated to use the half year to make as much progress as possible and not wait until there is an international agreement”, Dijsselbloem told reporters.
