In article ,
Bernard Peek wrote:

But what the euroseptics won't tell you is that the change was
pushed through by - wait for it - our very own UK, certainly as
a principal and possibly as the prime mover.

Apparently the UK argued for a minimum threshold below which businesses
did not need to register. The argument was not accepted.

The conspiracy theory is that the UK wanted their argument to fail so
that they would have another stick to beat the EU with.

You shouldn't trust Whitehall/Murdoch/Wail/Torygraph propaganda.

I was referring to the original proposal, which I knew of a long
time back, because Whitehall and Westminster were not happy that
UK residents were paying VAT to other countries for such things,
because the UK-favoured multinationals - surprise, surprise - use
the countries with the lowest VAT rate. And, yes, it was WE are
going to push for this - and WE did.

Also, I believe that there IS a minimum threshold. Whether that
compliant is genuine, I can't say - but, given it's timing, I
have my doubts. What the UK's representatives negotiate for
(or even insist on) and what is said to the UK public are often
not closely related.

Very probably, the original intent was to target only companies
like Amazon, and the UK's representatives misjudged, so the
threshold is far lower than was originally assumed. That is most
likely the nugget of truth around which the story you heard was
built.


Regards,
Nick Maclaren.