Sep 26

(9.00 – 12.30 CET)

Meeting of the European Parliament’s Committee of Inquiry into Money Laundering Tax Avoidance and Tax Evasion (PANA Committee)

The meeting is divided in 2 parts:

·   Part I – A hearing to get more insight in the world of professional soccer

·   Part II – Corporate tax planning

More information on the meeting as well as a link to the webpage where you can watch a live broadcast of the meeting can be found here.

Sep 27

CJEU expected to judge in Case C-73/16, Puškár (Protection of fundamental rights – List of personal data created for the purpose of controlling tax fraud – Admissibility of the list as evidence)

Question referred for a preliminary ruling:

(1)   Does Article 47(1) of the Charter, under which every person whose rights — including the right to privacy with respect to the processing of personal data in Article 1(1) et seq. of the Data Protection Directive — are violated has the right to an effective remedy before a court in compliance with the conditions in Article 47 of the Charter, against a provision of national law which makes the exercise of an effective remedy before a court, meaning an administrative court, conditional on the fact that the claimant, to protect his rights and freedoms, must have previously exhausted the procedures available under lex specialis — law on a specific subject — such as the Slovak Law on administrative complaints?

(2)   Can the right to respect for private and family life, home and communications, in Article 7 of the Charter, and the right to the protection of personal data in Article 8 be interpreted to the effect that where there is an alleged violation of the right to the protection of personal data, which, with respect to the European Union, is implemented primarily through the Directive, and under which, in particular

–  the Member States must protect the right to privacy with respect to the processing of personal data (Article [1](1)) and

–  the Member States are authorised to process personal data where this is necessary for the implementation of a task performed in the public interest (Article 7(e)) or is necessary for the purpose of a legitimate interests that is performed by the responsible authority or by the third party or parties to whom the data are disclosed, and

–  a Member State is exceptionally authorised to limit obligations and rights (Article 13(1)(e) and (f)), where such a restriction is necessary to safeguard an important economic or financial interest of a Member State or of the European Union, including monetary, budgetary and taxation matters,

are interpreted in such a way as not to allow a Member State to create, without the consent of the person concerned, a list of personal data for the purposes of tax administration, so that the fact that personal data is made available to a public authority for the purpose of combating tax fraud in itself constitutes a risk?

(3)   Can a list held by a financial authority of a Member State, which contains the claimant’s personal data and the inaccessibility of which has been secured by appropriate technical and organisational measures for the protection of personal data against unauthorised disclosure or access within the meaning of Article 17(1) of the Data Protection Directive, be regarded as unlawful evidence by virtue of the fact that it was obtained by the claimant without the lawful agreement of the relevant financial authority, which the referring court must refuse to admit in accordance with the requirements of EU law on a fair hearing in the second paragraph of Article 47(2) of the Charter ?

(4)   Is the abovementioned right to an effective legal remedy and to a fair hearing (in particular under Article 47 of the Charter) consistent with an approach taken by the referring court whereby, when, in this case, there is case-law from the European Court of Human Rights which differs from the answer obtained from the Court of Justice of the European Union, the referring court, in accordance with the principle of sincere cooperation in Article 4(3) TEU and Article 267 TFEU, gives precedence to the Court of Justice’s legal approach?

The Opinion of the Advocate General in this case can be found here