September 27 – A special European parliamentary group set up to look into tax evasion in football has been given a worrying overview of the scale of the problem.
The European Parliament’s committee of inquiry into Money Laundering, Tax Avoidance and Tax Evasion heard from several experts on Tuesday about an issue that was recently highlighted by the cases of Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo.
UEFA lawyer Julien Zylberstein told the hearing his organisation was limited in combatting tax evasion.
“Tax evasion is a clear threat to the social value of the sport, but this is really for the national tax authorities to intensify efforts to tackle the problem,” he said. “The powers of UEFA in this sphere are limited.”
Dutch journalist Merijn Rengers, who has specialised in probing tax evasion in football, provided an even bleaker picture. “There seems to be a lack of authority and some of the biggest clubs and players systematically channel money outside of European tax jurisdictions,” he told the hearing.
“During our investigations we were told by agents and others in the game that, ‘this is how it has always been, so leave us alone’.”
PANA committee chairman, Werner Langer described the answers provided by representative of both FIFA and UEFA as “not completely satisfactory” whilst another MEP Louis Michel accused officials of “a magnificent example of double talk” .
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