And thus Tax Whistleblowing was born! Comment on the Directive on whistleblowers in Tax Matters

Abstract

The European Union, which has been lagging behind for a long time, has finally acquired a general protection regime,at the end of 2019, a general whistleblower protection regime. The "Directive on the protection of persons who report violations of Union law", the 'Whistleblowers Directive' for short, aims to build on the protection of whistleblowers, by establishing a set of common minimum standards, with a view to strengthen the effectiveness of EU law in specific policy areas. The areas and acts of the Union concerned by the Directive are numerous. Taxation is no exception. A whistleblower who exposes a cross-border tax scheme set up by a fraudulent or abusive, should in principle be protected under the Whistleblowers Directive.
After reviewing the scope of the Directive, highlighting its tax implications, this paper critically examines the main principles established by the Directive: on the one hand, the obligation for private and public entities and competent authorities to establish reporting channels and on the other hand, the protection of persons who report in good faith and in accordance with procedure for reporting violations of Union law. This is further developed in the area of taxation

Keywords: whistleblowing, tax law, tax fraud, tax evasion, tax law enforcement

JEL Classification: K14, K22, K34, K42