The BMG submitted on 30 June 2016 these Comments on Action 15 on the proposed Multilateral Instrument which will amend existing tax treaties to implement changes agreed in the BEPS project.

Summary

The reports resulting from the project on Base Erosion and Profit Shifting (BEPS) include a number of proposals for changes in tax treaties, formulated as amendments to the OECD Model Convention and its Commentaries. The Multilateral Instrument (MLI) is intended to provide a method for quickly amending existing bilateral treaties. Hence, it must take the form of an actual self-standing treaty, and not a model. However, there are differences in the texts of the actual treaties to be amended, especially those involving developing countries, and based on the UN model. Hence, we suggest that the MLI should be accompanied by Country Schedules, bilaterally agreed, to ensure clarity as regards which treaties are amended and how. This would ensure that tax authorities, taxpayers and courts know which treaties have in fact been amended and their new language.

The core provisions of the MLI should be the basic provisions for preventing abuse of tax treaties and eliminating double non-taxation. Several variants have been proposed in BEPS Action 6, and it is essential that the MLI includes options which are suitable for developing countries. The revisions of the Permanent Establishment definition have been drafted in relation to the OECD Model, and a variant should be included which is compatible with the UN model, in consultation with the UN Committee.

The proposals for strengthening the Mutual Agreement Procedure (MAP) for resolving tax treaty disputes are unsuitable for developing countries, and should remain purely voluntary. This applies in particular to Mandatory Binding Arbitration, which we regard as illegitimate for all countries. Tax treaty provisions are binding in domestic law, and can be enforced through national tribunals. Accordingly, MNEs should not be given further privileges over other taxpayers. The MAP is an ‘amicable procedure’, and it is not appropriate to try to convert it into a supranational dispute settlement procedure. It is contrary to the due process of law, and indeed in many countries regarded as unconstitutional, for contentious interpretations of legal provisions to be made by secret and unaccountable administrative procedures, rather than by courts or tribunals in an open legal process. To make it mandatory for all conflicting interpretations to be resolved would provide a guarantee that aggressive tax planning would be riskless, and create an incentive to continue BEPS behavior. The main cause of the increase in tax disputes is the subjective basis of the transfer pricing rules, and it is inappropriate to expect the MAP to resolve issues which negotiators have failed to deal with in a principled manner.