An Assessment of the Polish Presidency of the Council Through the Lens of the EU VAT System

The Presidency of the Council is a unique event for each member of the European Union. The effectiveness of the presidency is a determinant of the position both in the Union and in the country. The article is an attempt to assess the effectiveness of the Presidency. A number of research questions were asked for this purpose. Firstly, whether the Polish Presidency achieved its own goals, whether it managed to achieve the goals of the group presidency (the so-called trio). Secondly, whether the Presidency achieved the goals set for it by doctrine and literature. The basis for the analysis is one of the sections of tax policy – the Community Value Added Tax. For this purpose, a legal-comparative method was applied, with the starting point being an analysis of the treaty-based mandate and the practical functioning of the presidency within the Ecofin Council configuration. The reference point for the assessment was the Trio Presidency Programme and the Hungarian Presidency, which preceded the Polish Presidency.