The European Tax Adviser Federation (ETAF) released on 23 October 2025 a new position paper highlighting the essential role of professional secrecy for tax advisers across Europe and the urgent need to safeguard it in EU legislation.
Professional secrecy is a cornerstone of the trust between clients and their advisers, ensuring that citizens and businesses can seek expert tax guidance in full confidence that sensitive information remains protected.
However, recent legislative and regulatory developments — including new EU reporting obligations, ECJ rulings and divergent national interpretations — increasingly threaten this fundamental principle. ETAF warns that without coherent EU-wide protection, professional secrecy risks being undermined, weakening both taxpayers’ rights and the integrity of European tax systems. It could also create distortions of competition between professions performing comparable functions, posing a real threat to the future of the tax advisory profession in some EU countries.
To address this, ETAF urges EU institutions and Member States to take decisive actions:
Professional secrecy is neither a privilege nor a favour, but an obligation. It is an essential element of any rule-of-law system and represents one of the core values of the exercise of the profession.
ETAF and its member organisations remain committed to working closely with European institutions to secure a legislative environment that respects professional secrecy, ensures legal certainty and guarantees equal protection for all EU citizens and businesses.
On 17 May 2023, ETAF President, Philippe Arraou, sent a letter to the Chair of the International Ethics Standards Board for Accountants (IESBA) with comments on its exposure draft on proposed revisions to the International Code of Ethics for Professional Accountants addressing tax planning and related services.
On 9 May 2023, ETAF sent a letter from its President, Philippe Arraou, to relevant negotiators in the European Parliament and in the Council of the EU to highlight the main profession's concerns regarding the upcoming trilogue negotiations on the AMLA Regulation, the AML Regulation and the 6th AML Directive.
On 20 January 2023, ETAF sent a letter from its President, Philippe Arraou, to ECON MEPs on the draft compromise amendments on the draft report on lessons learnt from the Pandora Papers and other revelations (2022/2080(INI)).
On 16 November 2022, ETAF sent a letter from its President, Philippe Arraou, to ECON MEPs on the Draft report on lessons learnt from the Pandora Papers and other revelations (2022/2080(INI)).
On 15 September 2022, ETAF sent a critical statement to FISC MEPs on the study they requested on the “Regulation of Intermediaries, including tax advisers, in the EU/Member States and best practices from inside and outside the EU”.
From the European Tax Adviser Federation (ETAF)’s view, the study shows some deficits in terms of quality and representativity. It is of utmost importance that the findings of the study are not misinterpreted, especially at a time when the European Commission is reflecting on how to better tackle the role of enablers who facilitate tax evasion and aggressive tax planning.
In June 2021, the European Parliament published an own-initiative report on the non-tariff and non-tax related obstacles within the Internal Market. The European Tax Adviser Federation (ETAF) sent a letter to MEPs Kosma Złotowski, Maria da Graça Carvalho, Marc Angel, Claudia Gamon, Claude Gruffat and Stelios Kouloglou to ask for several amendments which were important for the profession. The report will be voted on during the EP Plenary in November 2021.
The European Commission plans to publish an "Action Plan to fight tax evasion and make taxation simple and easy" in summer 2020. This action plan will include initiatives to combat tax fraud, to facilitate compliance with the tax rules and to further exploit new technical developments and the increasing digitalisation in order to achieve these goals. As part of an overall solution, the European Tax Adviser Federation (ETAF) would like to draw attention to the specific function of tax advisers in Europe, because this profession is situated directly at the interface between the taxpayers and the respective Member State.
The European Tax Adviser Federation thanks the OECD for the opportunity to comment on the roadmap Secretariat Proposal for a “Unified Approach” under Pillar One.
The potential impact of blockchain technologies are widespread among various industries, contrary to the main belief that blockchain is only related to cryptocurrencies. Every application of the blockchain in these industries implies a potential tax consequence to be examined in depth, because it can have an impact on the tax collecting process and on the taxation of the profits accrued by these blockchain-based activities.
From ETAF’s point of view, there are three main areas of concern for tax advisers regarding the blockchain technology. The first one, and possibly the most controversial, is connected with the security of financial information in the tax collecting process. Secondly, the taxation of profits earned by individuals and companies for their blockchain-based activities can be problematic. Finally, ETAF addresses the issue of possible tax avoidance / evasion connected with the loopholes in the regulatory framework in place for cryptocurrencies.
In July 2016 ETAF positioned itself on the current tax transparency initiatives on the one hand and the Single Market Strategy policies on the other hand and welcomed the Commissions’ ongoing work on fighting tax evasion and tax avoidance. However, ETAF raised some concerns about certain elements of the Single Market in professional regulations not being coherent with the Commissions’ objectives of increasing responsibilities of tax advisers.
