ECON Committee: Exchange of views with taxation Commissioner Šemeta on the FTT

23 November 2011

MEP Swinburne stressed that three Member States had already stated their opposition to an FTT, which she said meant that any further work was useless, as unanimity among Member States was required. Šemeta, however, felt that the positions of Member States were "converging".

The  possibility of actually introducing a financial transaction tax (FTT)  as part of the proposals for new own resources  for the EU  was questioned  by Anni Podimata (S&D, EL), although she admitted the need for such an EU-wide tax.

The need to ensure complete reliability of statistics was stressed by several MEPs. In reply, Mr Šemeta said that Eurostat is already well-equipped to avoid any political interference when delivering data, and that he was committed to ensuring that Eurostat data are also perceived as reliable, especially by markets.

© European Parliament