France vows to pursue biggest tax cheats
The French government is planning to increase enforcement of taxation controls and to toughen penalties for tax evasion, with a fresh focus on combating major fraud, according to the Minister of Public Action and Accounts Gabriel Attal.
The minister noted that the number of inspections of the country’s biggest businesses would be increased by 25% by the end of the second presidential term of Emmanuel Macron in 2027.
According to Attal, the efforts would be focused on the “high end of the spectrum, on the biggest scams, the most complex ones, those that often have international involvement.”
“We are planning to pile pressure on the super-rich and the multinationals, thus alleviating the pressure on the middle classes and small business owners,” he told France Inter radio on Tuesday. “There is an overwhelming majority of French, who work and pay taxes, who are victims of this fraud.”
Attal also highlighted the necessity to “alleviate the pressure on the small taxpayers” by simplifying the system of declaration and by establishing “an automatic penalty waiver for the first error.” He also pledged to create “an automatic reverse of penalty” in favor of a taxpayer in the event of an error by the government.
As part of the plan, the country’s authorities are expected to conduct tax audits of the 100 largest companies on the stock market every other year, as no specific frequency of such inspections has been established for French corporate majors.
The ministry is planning to hire 1,500 additional employees to carry out the more numerous tax audits by 2027. Moreover, a new tax intelligence service is to be set up under the Ministry of Economy and Finance, with a hundred “elite agents” to be hired in the fight against major tax fraud at international level.
According to the latest data provided by French authorities, anti-tax fraud measures have helped to claim a return of €14.6 billion (almost $16 billion) to the treasury, an increase of 8.2% compared to 2021.
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