Oct. 9 () –
Ciudadanos has proposed to the Congress of Deputies to adapt the tax on extraordinary income of large energy companies to the proposal agreed by the States of the European Union and imitate this design for the banking tax.
This proposal goes through limiting the application of the tax to oil, gas and mining companies, leaving out the electricity companies, and taxing the profits of a single year (in its proposal, 2022) that exceed by 20% the average obtained in the three previous years, which would be taxed at 33%.
This is stated in the amendment to the entire alternative text that the ‘orange’ formation will submit to a vote in Congress to replace the bill promoted by PSOE and United We Can, to which Europa Press has had access.
FINALIST CHARACTER: SUPPORT FOR CONSUMERS AND INVESTMENTS
Likewise, Cs proposes a finalist nature of the new taxes, by legally limiting their collection to certain purposes, which in the case of energy are measures to support consumers, reduce consumption, industries dependent on energy or conditioned by investments in renewables, efficiency and decarbonization.
Also for measures to support energy autonomy, “especially those with a cross-border dimension”, so that its collection could be used to finance interconnections such as the reactivation of the Midcat trans-Pyrenean gas pipeline.
In the case of the bank tax, Cs wants the collection to go to support bank debtors and a deduction in personal income tax to deduct up to 400 euros from the payment of variable-rate mortgage interest on habitual residence.
IT WOULD LEAVE OUT THE ELECTRICAL
In his initiative, the only one that has been registered to try to knock down the new taxes or replace them with an alternative once the term has closed this week in the Chamber, Cs recognizes that “solutions must be provided that alleviate the pockets of some citizens suffocated by a price level that has triggered the rates of poverty and extreme poverty”.
However, he proposes not to apply the energy tax to electricity companies, considering that they are already subject to the reduction of income due to the extra cost of gas and the cap on gas, for which he considers that “it would not be appropriate for Spain to impose additional taxes on potential profits, much less on potential income that is already limited by law”.
WOULD TAX PROFITS, NOT INCOME
For this reason, it proposes that the tax be limited to the oil, gas and coal sector, as the EU Energy Ministers have agreed, and levy 33% on profits obtained in 2022 that exceed 20% on obtained, on average, in the last four years.
The EU proposal is to tax the benefits of 2023, while Cs wants them to be those obtained in the current year and the Government had proposed a tax of a much lower rate, but on all the income obtained).
The alternative of the ‘orange’ formation, in addition, would be limited to those companies in these sectors that concentrate 75% of their activity on extraction, mining, oil refining or the manufacture of coke ovens, so it would leave out energy companies with more diversified activity.
THE BANK TAX, FOR ALL CREDIT INSTITUTIONS
For banking, Cs agrees with the Government on the need to also impose a tax, but defends that it also be “exceptional and limited to a single year” and with identical considerations to energy — 33% on excess profits, to from 20% of those obtained, on average, in the last three years–.
As in the energy sector, Cs proposes not to differentiate by billing volume (the PSOE and United We Can proposal would only apply to entities with a billing of more than 1,000 million per year) and in the case of the bank levy, apply it to all entities of credit and credit financial establishment
