The European Commission has ordered the Belgian government to collect €700 million of taxes from 35 multinational companies trading in that country.

The EU Competition Commissioner, Margrethe Vestager, says that the Belgian government has been doing illegal ‘sweetheart’ deals to attract business from large companies. But these deals are unfair to small companies that don’t get the same benefits, are unfair to other European countries, and break EU state aid rules.

This is one of the roles of the Commission, playing the role of umpire, doing the job of enforcing the rules intended to guarantee fair play, and protecting British interests from unfair competition.