The Member States that have based their pension systems on the second pillar have been saving, often through joint employer-employee schemes, and, in some cases, in the new Member States, through mixed schemes. The funds have been put into savings funds, pension funds or they appear on companies’ balance sheets.

I am convinced that, once Member States agree on ways of closing existing loopholes in the Savings Taxation Directive, it is likely that the Council will ask the Commission to update in a similar way the agreements with the five non-EU countries and the 10 other jurisdictions participating in the savings taxation mechanism.

25. Recognises the fact that public pension systems strengthen social solidarity and are the responsibility of the Member States and that safeguarding these systems should be a political priority; believes that greater use of alternatives to state-funded pensions, such as supplementary schemes, could be a viable alternative; points out that private pensions could include occupational supplementary pension schemes by employers or other collective organisations and associations and individual supplementary pensions based on savings; emphasises that the existence of private pensions would increase the need for the appropriate regulation ...[+++]of private pension funds, the portability of such pensions and the promotion and continued modernisation (including more flexibility) of these alternatives; within this framework, believes that the risk should be taken into account that women in the context of the existing public pension system might lose insurance coverage if private provisions are to replace this system, but that this risk can be reduced by crediting pension entitlements for maternity leave, parental leave and breaks from work for personal reasons;

25. Recognises the fact that public pension systems strengthen social solidarity and are the responsibility of Member States and that safeguarding these systems should be a political priority; believes that greater use of alternatives to state-funded pensions, such as supplementary schemes, could be a viable alternative; points out that private pensions could include occupational supplementary pension schemes by employers or other collective organisations and associations and individual supplementary pensions based on savings; emphasises that the existence of private pensions would increase the need for the appropriate regulation of p ...[+++]rivate pension funds, the portability of such pensions and the promotion and continued modernisation (including more flexibility) of these alternatives; within this framework, believes that the risk should be taken into account that women in the context of the existing public pension system might lose insurance coverage if private provisions are to replace this system, but that this risk can be reduced by crediting pension entitlements maternity leave, parental leave and breaks from work for personal reasons;

In the absence of any coordination of national tax systems for taxation of savings income in the form of interest payments, particularly as far as the treatment of interest received by non-residents is concerned, residents of Member States are currently often able to avoid any form of taxation in their Member State of residence on interest they receive in another Member State.

Indent 12 further mentions that "the objective of this Directive, which is that of the effective taxation of cross-border savings income within the Community, cannot be sufficiently achieved by the Member States, because of the absence of any co-ordination of national systems for the taxation of savings income"(emphasis added).