The sending of notifications to the 311 companies in the Madeira Free Zone identified as beneficiaries of illegal state aid began on June 27 and is expected to last several months, according to an official source from the Ministry of Finance.
The notifications for the recovery of State aid for the exercise of the right to be heard by taxpayers began to be sent on June 27 and it is estimated that, given the number of entities covered and different types of companies, for a few months. of this year,” said the official source in response to Lusa.
The notifications are being sent by the Tax and Customs Authority, the same response was needed.
At stake are companies that, under the so-called Regime III of the Madeira Free Trade Zone (ZFM), have benefited from tax aid between 2007 and 2020, such as reduced corporate tax rates, but which, according to the European Commission (EC) after an in-depth investigation, did not meet the conditions to benefit from State aid granted under that scheme.
Following this investigation, the EC indicated that Portugal had to recover the aid provided irregularly, focusing this recovery on the aid in a amount greater than 200 thousand euros.
In the same response, the Ministry of Finance indicates that it is estimated that “311 beneficiaries are covered, in a total tax to be recovered of approximately 833 million euros.” This amount will be added to the interest accrued and due in the meantime.
Regime III was approved in 2007 for the period between January 1 of that year and December 31, 2013, and companies registered until the end of 2013 could benefit from a reduction in corporate tax or other tax exemptions.
On December 4, 2020, after an in-depth investigation started in 2018, the community executive announced that it had concluded that “the implementation of Regime III of the Madeira Free Zone in Portugal is not in line with Madeira state aid decisions Islands”. Commission.
According to the community executive, the objective of regime III was to contribute to the development of the outermost region of Madeira through tax incentives, aimed exclusively at companies that generate employment in the region, which it concluded is not the case. Faced with the decision and Brussels, the Portuguese State and the Autonomous Region of Madeira, meanwhile, have filed an appeal with the Court of Justice of the European Union.
Between 1987 (the year the free zone was created) and 2014, the The European Commission approved four versions of the ZFM aid schemewithin the framework of the community provisions that regulate this type of aid.
The aid scheme approved for the ZFM was aimed at attracting investment and job creation in the region, which resulted, in particular, in tax reductions on profits derived from activities carried out in Madeira.
Source: Observadora
