Mr. Carlos Martínez Mongay:

First, taxes are collected in order to finance expenditure, including the support of childcare and healthcare. That is the purpose of taxes. It is also to support borrowers in the housing market or to provide social housing. The decision to raise taxes is because we want to finance expenditure but sometimes we see there is a mismatch between the expenditure and the taxes that should be collected to finance it.

Second, we should not forget that all of us in the Single Market have a series of freedoms - the freedom of movement, of people and of goods, services and capital. What the Commission wants to avoid is that we end up in a kind of competition across the member states in order to attract capital one from the other instead of creating the conditions for an efficient allocation of capital within the Single Market.

At the same time, the Commission fully respects subsidiarity. The Commission usually does not determine how much tax a member state must collect out of all the possible options, but of course sometimes subsidiarity has to be consistent with the general principle of maintaining the Single Market and preserving the four freedoms.