With the tax decree linked to the next budget law, there will also be a first cut in excise duties on petrol, a measure promised several times by the Northern League's deputy prime minister and interior minister, Matteo Salvini. The operation should have a value between 200 and 300 million, thus involving a reduction in the price at the pump of about three cents a litre. To finance the measure, the State could use the extra revenue from VAT deriving precisely from the increase in the price of fuel recorded in recent months. The presentation of the Def, the Document of Economics and Finance, has reached its final stage and the ministries are working to finalize and focus on the final details. Under the lens are above all the hedging, the subject of a real tug of war between the Minister of Economy Giovanni Tria and the Deputy Prime Minister Luigi Di Maio who threatened not to vote for the Def if he does not obtain the requested measures. But let's see what the main changes are.
EVEN THE VAT IN THE FISCAL PEACE
VAT is also at the center of another fundamental debate. In fact, fiscal peace could also concern value added tax. This was announced by the Undersecretary for the Economy, Massimo Bitonci, explaining that the government is evaluating various hypotheses in this direction.
The main idea is to allow disputes with the tax authorities to be settled by paying the tax evaded with a discount only on penalties and interest. But it probably won't be possible, because VAT is a Community tax. Already in 2002 the European Court of Justice rejected the grave amnesty of the second Berlusconi government, which included VAT, forcing the Italian tax authorities to recover the forgiven sums.
THE CEILING FOR REMEDIABLE EVASION
Another central issue for the tax decree is the maximum amount that can be remedied with the tax settlement. The League wants to set the ceiling at one million euros (difficult in this case to present the operation as a protection for poor people), while the 5 Star Movement pushes to lower the bar to 100 thousand euros. The solution could be a compromise: diversified limits depending on the type of amnesty to which one adheres (scrapping of files, closure of pending disputes, amnesty of investigations).
THIRD HYPOTHESIS SCRAPPING OF THE FOLDERS
To recover other resources, the Government could then decide to launch a third scrapping of the tax bills, even if the first two are still in progress: the first ends with this month's payments, the second with those of February 2019.
The novelty compared to the first two editions could concern the installments: their number could increase up to a maximum of 10 and the payments could be deferred over several years. At the same time, membership of the first two regularizations could be reopened for those who have folders relating to the years covered by the previous scrapping but have not joined.
