The issue has been on the lips of the Socialists in recent days, greatly encouraged by the president of the party who has bluntly defended the creation of a tax on extraordinary profits that some companies are having in times of crisis. The parliamentary leader of the PS is further back in that ambition and says that progress in this matter should seek a solution “as concerted as possible within the framework of the European Union”.
Eurico Brilhante Dias’s argument is “not to create in Portugal a disadvantage that others do not want to take”, referring to the fact that some countries that have already advanced -and on the list of those that have already taken them are Italy, the United Kingdom and Spain- – with measures that have already had to adjust, in the case of the Italian government.
“We must be fair and there is no social justice without tax justice, but we cannot penalize the Portuguese“, continued the socialist after a visit, within the framework of the Parliamentary Conference, to a mold company, in Marinha Grande, with projects of the Recovery and Resilience Plan. “We have to take balanced measures, not eliminating any solution, neither in the fiscal dimension nor in the direct intervention of the markets”.
Eurico Brilhante Dias also affirmed that, in energy, the Government has already advanced to “smash” these disproportionate profits of the companies in the sector with the Iberian energy mechanism and the regulated gas market. Two instruments that “substantially eliminate abusive profits,” argued the socialist.
It so happens that when the prime minister admitted having studied this hypothesis, in mid-August, he said that it was not in this sector or in the distribution sector that he saw the need for such taxation. As for the oil companies, anthony coast He spoke of the need to “analyze carefully”, since it is one of the sectors “where these surpluses are still not adequately monitored”. When asked about this sector in particular, Eurico Brilhante Dias is more withdrawn and takes refuge in the price formation that takes place in international markets.
Pressure mounts on PS to tax windfall gains. Pedro Marqués joins César
The subject has marked rented socialist — in fact, it came from the end of the political period — and the windfall profits tax has been gaining followers, even after President Carlos César spoke about it. One of them was also at the beginning of the political season organized by the party, the MEP Pedro Marques.
Eurico Brilhante Dias admits, in the statements he made to journalists this Monday, that there will be divergence, saying that “there is one aspect in which there is no divergence” when referring to the maxim “there is no social justice without fiscal justice.” , but he says water in this boil, as, by the way, he had already done the finance Minister this weekend when he said in Prague that rising energy prices could not be fixed by taxes.
Just last week the President of the European CommissionUrsula von der Leyen said that “the oil and gas companies are also making massive profits, so we are going to propose that they pay a solidarity contribution to help deal with this crisis.”
Source: Observadora
