The Commission prepared a number of new initiatives on taxation. It presented an amended proposal for a Directive to ensure effective
taxation of cross-border interest payments to individuals within the Union. Under the amended proposal, each Member State provides information to other Member States on interest paid from that Member State to individual savers resident in other Member States. For a transitional period of seven years, Belgium, Luxembourg and Austria would be allowed to apply a withholding tax instead of providing information. The proposal covers interest from savings of every kind, including bonds. It replaces the Commission%%%%s 1998 savings proposal that would have allowed Member States to choose between exchanging information or applying a withholding tax.