Heavy bang of the ACES: Sweden scraps skattelöftet.

the Government has scrapped its promise to free all ACE employees from the tax. It allows the research facility can cost a quarter of a billion dollars more a year. Now continue the ACE to chase other tax breaks.

Sweden provided lots of promises to get to be the host country for the research facility ESS. The Swedish state pays together with Region Skåne sek 6.8 billion for the construction work. And in addition, promised Sweden to pay hundreds of millions of sek to foreign research projects, including röntgenlaseranläggningen XFEL in Hamburg.

the Construction of the research facility ESS in Lund. Here is galleribyggnaden, which runs along the 537 metres long acceleratortunneln. In galleribyggnaden is electricity, cooling and other installations needed for the accelerator.Image: Lars Brundin

But Sweden also promised to give the ACES the comprehensive tax relief. Some have already fallen into place. For example, the parliament voted a special law that allows the ACE brand don’t have to pay vat, energy tax and other excise taxes.

” Germany is not interested to pay tax on the energy to Sweden, said johanna nilsson state secretary Peter Honeth to Sydsvenskan in connection with that, ACE began construction in september 2014.

the ACES will consume as much electricity as the whole of Laholm municipality: 270 gigawatt-hours per year. This means that the ACE saves over 60 million per year to avoid paying tax and vat on electricity.

But the most important thing skattelöftet from Sweden was another: the hundreds of people who will work on the ACES don’t have to pay inomstskatt in Sweden.

” this exemption from income tax has not landed yet. But it is something that we talk about with our contacts at the ministry of education. This is a question that is alive, but not completed, ” says Agneta Nestenborg, who is the administrative director of ACE, when we meet her in Lund in the beginning of november.

Agneta Nestenborg, administrative director for the ACE.Image: Lars Brundin

For the ESS, it is crucial that the research facility is able to attract the right staff, from all over the world. And then, it is an important carrot that the staff won’t have to pay tax.

– It becomes very, very important with the tax exemption. In the long-term perspective so överrider the question all the other administrative issues that we live with right now, ” says Agneta Nestenborg.

Many foreign researchers on the ACE will have contracts that expire in a few years. It is not certain that their partner gets a job in Sweden, which means that they must feed the entire family on the salary from ACE. Then a tax exemption is an important piece of the puzzle for the researchers should choose Sweden, reads the argument.

the Promise to remove the income tax for the ACE employees came from Fredrik reinfeldt’s center-right government under förhandlingsspelet to get the ESS to Sweden.

But how is it now with the tax exemption? We make a call to the responsible minister Helene Hellmark Knutsson (S) and ask. Then she comes with a surprising vengeance. It turns out that the new red-green government has scrapped the plans to the ACE should completely avoid paying income tax for the employees:

– ACE has not come forward with a formal request to the government on this issue. This is because ACE has not managed to create the unity of the whole board of directors and among all member states. There is a resistance against this exemption from certain countries, ” says science Helene Hellmark Knutsson (S).

– on the other hand, we see that ACE has good conditions for recruitment and the migration of skilled labour. ACE has the opportunity to offer their staff the Swedish expertskatt, said the minister.

Science Helene Hellmark Knutsson (S), visit the ESS in september 2015.Image: Lars Brundin

Lars Börjesson, president of the international council which governs the ACE, confirms that several countries have sat on the crosswise and stopped the plans to the ESS staff will be exempt from income tax.

He says that skattediskussionen was several years ago and has been a dead issue ever since.

– It was brought in the then-advisory international committee, prior to the formation of the ESS ERIC. It has not been an issue for the international council since then, ” he says.

Professor Lars Börjesson, who also is the chairman of the international council which governs the ACE, do segergesten when the foundation stone for the research facility will be in place in October, 2014.Image: Peter Frennesson

But the information has clearly not reached to the highest officials in the ACE.

“this have I heard,” says Agneta Nestenborg, administrative director of ACE, when we call back to her.

this makes the operating cost of ESS is increasing rapidly. How will you cope with that?

” I have to think on it. It is the politicians who take the decisions. It is something we must adapt to. But, precisely, in detail, how we should handle this, I don’t know, ” says Agneta Nestenborg.

It trashed the promise of tax exemption can be costly for the ACES – and, ultimately, the taxpayers in Sweden and Denmark.

In may 2015 sent the Spanish ministry of industry a warning letter to the Swedish and Danish government about what happens if the tax exemption. Spain points out that then the ACE 200 – 300 million more expensive per year. It is about a fifth of the operation of the ACE.

The Spanish secretary of state Carmen Vela Olmo writes in the letter that it is “very important” that Sweden and Denmark are pushing through skattelöftet. If ACE can’t get the new tax laws, according to Spain, it is necessary to find alternatives for cost reduction in a similar amount, maybe an increase of the host countries ‘contribution to the ESS during the duty cycle”.

thus, It can mean that Sweden and Denmark may pay an additional quarter of a billion dollars per year.

Now continue ACE to push on to get better fiscal conditions. For example, to the management of the ESS to the Swedish expert taxation after the Danish model should be extended from three to five years.

The current Swedish expert taxation means that the foreign staff won’t have to estimate 25 per cent of their income in Sweden during their first three years in the country. Some benefits are also completely tax exempt, as the cost of children’s schooling in Sweden and two repatriation per year.

When the international council that controls the ACE had its most recent meeting, they decided also to push the issue of skattebefriesle for foreign personnel in Sweden a shorter time to install the equipment on the ESS.