The Council reached political agreement on a draft directive aimed at strengthening administrative cooperation in the field of direct taxation so as to enable the member states to better combat tax fraud.

The Council's discussion focused on two issues

1. The exchange of information on request. In order to allay the risk of member states making imprecise requests aimed at detecting irregularities (“fishing expeditions”), the Council agreed to identify in the directive certain details that must be specified in requests for information, namely the identity of the person under investigation and the tax purpose for which the information is sought. These details are however less stringent than in the OECD convention, thus allowing for more scope for information exchange;
2. The automatic exchange of information. The Council agreed on a step-by-step approach aimed at eventually ensuring unconditional exchange of information for eight categories of income and capital. From 2015, member states will communicate automatically information for a maximum of five categories, provided that that information is readily available (they will however not be required to send more information than they receive in return). By 1 July 2017, the Commission will provide a report and, if need be, a proposal.

The Council will adopt the directive without further discussion at a forthcoming meeting, once the text has been finalized.

For full details see http://www.consilium.europa.eu/uedocs/cms_data/docs/pressdata/en/ecofin/118257.pdf