Romania, Malta and Greece were the worst performing in the rankings with Romania failing to collect a third of the VAT it should have been paid.

EU member states lost an estimated €134bn (£114bn) in VAT in 2019, down from €141bn in 2018, according to the latest VAT gap report released by the European Commission. This represented a 5% drop in the total losses recorded the previous year.

This figure represents revenues lost to VAT fraud and evasion, VAT avoidance and optimisation practices, bankruptcies and financial insolvencies, as well as miscalculations and administrative errors.