spiritsNEWS March 2016

Review of EU Excise Directive 92/83: an opportunity to be taken

There are a number of serious difficulties with the fiscal treatment of spirits in the EU.  Many of these can be traced back to the main excise directives, adopted at a time when there were just 12 Member States.  The Commission’s decision to review the structures directive (92/83) provides an opportunity to seek improvements for spirits producers, even if it is the minimum rates directive (92/84) that is of most concern as it penalises spirits, although all alcoholic beverages compete in the same market. 

 

Our submissions to the consultations in the autumn stressed that many of the difficulties in the alcoholic beverage sector could be resolved with a more rational excise tax structure in the EU.  Whether in relation to the classification of alcoholic beverages for tax purposes, or in the different treatment of small producers (the reduced rates available for beer are a thousand times more generous than for spirits), there is a clear need to treat spirits more fairly.  Improvements would also seem likely to help in the fight against illicit alcohol, a large driver of which is the high tax rates on spirits which push up consumer prices and make tax-unpaid alcohol attractive to unscrupulous producers.  

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