In the sights of the government: the “ultra-rich” and the multinationals which evade taxes and which therefore do not pay “what they owe” to the State. The government’s long-promised plan to fight tax evasion will toughen controls and sanctions against them while easing “the pressure on the small taxpayer”.
Before an official presentation this Tuesday, May 9, the Minister Delegate in charge of Public Accounts, Gabriel Attal, reserved for the newspaper The world Monday the main measures of this plan, which aims to respond to the “demand for justice” formulated by the French, he specifies. The Express takes stock of the announcements.
25% of tax audits “on large estates”
This plan provides for a 25% increase in tax audits “on large estates” by the end of the five-year term. At present, no threshold has been set, adds the ministry, questioned by AFP.
Checks for the 100 largest market caps
There are also plans for tax audits every two years for the 100 largest market capitalisations. To date, there was no precise rhythm set for large groups, specifies the ministry.
A sanction of fiscal and civic indignity
Bercy intends to toughen the penalties against fraudsters and, “for the most serious faults” (such as concealment of assets abroad) is considering a “penalty of fiscal and civic indignity”, in the form of a deprivation of reduction or tax credit as well as the right to vote “for a certain period”, warned Gabriel Attal in his interview with World.
These proposals will however have to go through the Council of State which will have to gauge their constitutionality, conceded Gabriel Attal.
A new elite unit in Bercy
The minister also affirms that “1,500 additional staff” will expand the teams fighting against tax evasion by 2027. A new tax intelligence service in Bercy, with a hundred “elite agents” from ‘by the end of the five-year term, will be dedicated to the fight against major international fraud, the minister again promised.
Tracfin, Bercy’s financial intelligence unit, cannot use tax evasion intelligence techniques, the ministry told AFP, “except when the case involves organized crime”.
The new service will be able to use “eavesdropping, data capture, beaconing” to seek information “in non-cooperative states or territories” such as Panama or the Bahamas. “Our priority: to make the ultra-rich and the multinationals who defraud pay what they owe,” assures Gabriel Attal.
Reduce the pressure on the small taxpayer
By attacking the wealthiest, the Minister insists at the same time on the idea of ”alleviating the pressure on the small taxpayer, the small boss, by massifying” the regularizations rather than having recourse to controls and by establishing “a automatic penalty waiver for the first error”.
Another gesture towards common taxpayers: the creation of an “automatic reverse penalty in favor of the taxpayer in the event of an error by the administration”, declared Gabriel Attal. By sparing them, the presidential majority hopes to attract into its fold the middle classes which could be tempted by the extreme right.
In France, “10% of taxpayers pay 70% of income tax”, recalled the minister for whom the fraud “of the most powerful is unforgivable”. “I’m not saying that they defraud more, but when it happens, the amounts are significant,” said the minister.