The executive president, Edson Vismona, and the chairman of the ETCO Advisory Council, Everardo Maciel, opened the seminar on Taxation and Legal Security.
Vismona highlighted the importance of the topic and of the jurists who agreed to debate it at the invitation of the Institute and pointed out the two extremes of the legal uncertainty in force in Brazil: on the one hand, the excess of requirements that hinder the lives of good taxpayers; and, on the other hand, unfair competition from incumbent tax debtors.
Everardo Maciel, coordinator of the Seminar, recalled the fundamental role that legal security plays in the willingness of investors to invest their resources in business in Brazil.
Transcript of opening speeches
EDSON VIMONA:
Good afternoon.
First of all, I would like to thank our highly qualified audience for this event of ours, and especially our members of the deliberative and advisory board of our presidents Victorio De Marchi and Everardo Maciel and, of course, our teachers who immediately accepted, without any doubt , this is our call.
It is a call for reflection. And I speak here of professor Humberto Ávila, professor Roberto Quiroga, Heleno Torres, professor Hamilton Dias de Souza and Gustavo Brigagão.
We are also grateful for the support of the Association of Federal Judges, the Brazilian Association of Financial Law, and CESA, the Council of Studies of Law Firms.
We are promoting this seminar to fulfill our mission, which is to deepen reflections, at a crucial moment so that we can bring contributions to governments and create critical mass on issues that are absolutely important.
We are sure that the time has come to move forward. As you saw in our film, some initiatives that we had and that we are insisting on taking forward, one of them, is a document that we elaborated on taxation and development.
And we chose a more pragmatic, simpler path, not to face a discussion that we know will be very difficult, of tax reform, but more immediate measures that can help, and a lot, development, doing business, here in Brazil.
We have to identify how we can reach our destination. Which is economic development. Social. Which is legal security, fundamental in this process.
The watchword is to reform. Everyone is discussing this, in all instances, and we know the difficulties that we will have to face in order to move forward in this process.
Our invited jurists will deal here with taxation from the perspective of development, the interpretation of the tax law, the tax process, tax reform and taxation in the XNUMXst century.
These are themes that exasperate any entrepreneur in Brazil.
We have a tax group that has discussed some issues that we face, the difficulties that we face in our daily lives.
For example, the fine that is soon aggravated and that already has the threat of criminal action against companies. As if everyone had the objective to defraud.
These threats, together with the so-called “accessory obligations” - and, in the words of our members of the [ETCO] tax group, even the tax authorities themselves do not understand how many accessory obligations are and how they intersect - have led our companies to assume responsibility. following maxim: "I shouldn't, I deny it, but I have to pay". Because the threats are concrete.
On the contrary, on the other side of this spectrum, a hidden and increasingly established force - and we have been fighting this, and Professor Hamilton has been a great leader in this process -, we have the so-called "hard debtor". This one says: "I must, I do not deny, I do not pay".
These are the two situations we face. And we have to validate, with the State, new attitudes, because we are reaching, or if we have not passed, the acceptable limit.
So, with all these issues that plague us and make the necessary legal certainty unfeasible, it is that we are offering this excellent contribution, one of the best, that we managed to add this afternoon.
Let's collaborate. Let's participate. Let's discuss. But with a very well-defined focus on the goals we have to achieve.
What is at risk is our development. What is at risk is that we move forward in a sustainable process. Companies need this formal, fatal, necessary issue that is legal security.
Once again, I thank everyone for their presence. I will pass the floor to our coordinator, who organized all of our event, Professor Everardo Maciel.
EVERARDO MACIEL: First of all, I would like to thank the eminent Brazilian lawyers who decided to offer their contribution, bring their convictions to a topic that I consider the most relevant topic for the country in terms of investment, especially in the tax field, which is legal security .
And as, as a coordinator and almost a timekeeper, which is what I am going to do, which I will have nothing to add to what so eminent jurists will speak, I pass the floor first to Professor Heleno Torres who will deal with legal security and tax process.
