At the request of The Left, the Parliament held a plenary session on Wednesday 12 July to debate the taxation of wealth. The debate divided the elected representatives, with the right-wing groups opposed and the left-wing groups in favour.
The group’s chair, French MEP Manon Aubry, wanted to highlight the paradox of the current economic situation. “One person in six does not have enough to eat in the richest continent in the world; this is the result of inflation, which is hitting European households hard”, she said critically. “According to the ECB, most of this inflation is caused by corporate super-profits, which feed shareholders’ dividends and bosses’ salaries”, she added, describing this as “indecent”.
Taking the example of the directive on the taxation of multinationals, Biljana Borzan (S&D, Croatian) felt that it was “time to be brave and take another step towards a fairer distribution of wealth”, she stressed.
Kira Marie Peter-Hansen (Greens/EFA, Danish) also condemned “the extremely high concentration of wealth in Europe”, with the richest 1% holding over 30% of total wealth. “The EU has the potential to save our planet, educate our children and care for our elders”, she said.
On the other hand, Markus Ferber (EPP, German) felt that the Member States did not have a tax revenue problem. “The problem is spending, which has increased”, he retorted. Filip De Man (ID, Belgian) made the same point: “Spending more and taking ever more, that’s a left-wing precept that we don’t support”, he said.
Renew Europe’s position was less clear-cut. France’s Valérie Hayer felt that “the leftists” wanted to “attack success blindly and indiscriminately, regardless of effectiveness”. In her view, such a measure would lead to capital flight and should therefore be considered on a global scale. Ireland’s Billy Kelleher has called for “an open, constructive debate to relieve the burden on labour”, which is already heavily taxed (see EUROPE 13219/16).
For Paolo Gentiloni, “it is clear that the public expects us all to show determination, despite the limitations that the common jurisdiction have in this area”.
On Tuesday 11 July, the Commission also decided to register the European citizens’ initiative calling for a European tax on large fortunes to benefit the ecological and social transition (see EUROPE 13198/21). One of the initiators, Aurore Lalucq (S&D, French), was delighted: “It’s a good signal, because it could have killed the initiative or unblocked it”, she told EUROPE on Wednesday. The organisers must now decide when to launch the signature process. (Original version in French by Anne Damiani)