That was the stark warning on the move to a ‘zero-ten’ tax structure issued to a States scrutiny panel this week by UK tax expert Richard Murphy.
He picked out several examples of how the detail included in the Fiscal Strategy, approved by the States last month after many months of debate, would not satisfy EU tax rules.
Mr Murphy said that it was highly surprising that no one had yet consulted Brussels, especially as the former Policy and Resources president, Pierre Horsfall, had promised the UK government in 2002 that all tax measures would comply with European requirements.
The president of Finance and Economics, Senator Terry Le Sueur, admitted to the scrutiny panel on Thursday that he had not taken the proposals to Europe and had no imminent plans to do so.
‘We know enough about what is and what is not acceptable,’ he told the panel, adding that a lot more work had to be done to address ‘the devil in the detail’.
