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POLITICS

Italy’s Meloni criticises her own government’s ‘Big Brother tax’ law

Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni on Wednesday criticised an "invasive" tax evasion measure reintroduced by her own government, sparking accusations of incompetence from opposition lawmakers.

Italy's Meloni criticises her own government's 'Big Brother tax' law
Italy's Prime Minister, Giorgia Meloni was ridiculed by opposition leaders on Wednesday after she criticised a tax law brought in by a member of her own party. (Photo by Filippo MONTEFORTE / AFP)

The measure, allowing Italy’s tax authorities to check bank accounts to look for discrepancies between someone’s declared income and their spending, was abolished in 2018 but its return was announced in the government’s official journal of business this week.

Meloni had previously been strongly critical of the ‘redditometro’ measure, and took to social media on Wednesday to defend herself from accusations of hypocrisy.

“Never will any ‘Big Brother tax’ be introduced by this government,” she wrote on Facebook.

Meloni said she had asked deputy economy minister Maurizio Leo – a member of her own far-right Brothers of Italy party, who introduced the measure – to bring it to the next cabinet meeting.

“And if changes are necessary, I will be the first to ask,” she wrote.

Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani, who heads the right-wing Forza Italia party, also railed against what he called an “obsolete tool”.

He called for it to be revoked, saying it did not fight tax evasion but “oppresses, invades people’s lives”.

Deputy Prime Minister Matteo Salvini, who leads the far-right League party, said it was “one of the horrors of the past” and deserved to stay there.

Opposition parties revelled in the turmoil within the governing coalition, where tensions are already high ahead of European Parliament elections in which all three parties are competing with each other.

“They are not bad, they are just incapable,” said former premier Matteo Renzi, now leader of a small centrist party.

Another former premier, Five Star Movement leader Giuseppe Conte, asked of Meloni: “Was she asleep?”

The measure allows tax authorities to take into account when assessing someone’s real income elements including jewellery, life insurance, horse ownership, gas and electricity bills, pets and hairdressing expenses.

According to the government, tax evasion and fraud cost the Italian state around 95 to 100 billion euros each year.

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POLITICS

Italy’s ruling party shrugs off youth wing’s Fascist salutes

Italian PM Giorgia Meloni's far-right Brothers of Italy party on Wednesday dismissed an undercover media investigation into the Fascist leanings of its youth wing.

Italy's ruling party shrugs off youth wing's Fascist salutes

“The journalistic report was built on the basis of fragmented, decontextualised images, taken in a private setting,” said Luca Ciriani, minister for relations with parliament and a member of Meloni’s Brothers of Italy party.

The investigation published last week by Italian news website Fanpage included video of members of the National Youth, the junior wing of Brothers of Italy, which has post-fascist roots, in Rome.

In images secretly filmed by an undercover journalist, they are seen performing Fascist salutes, chanting the Nazi ‘Sieg Heil’ greeting and shouting ‘Duce’ in support of Italian dictator Benito Mussolini.

At one meeting, a youth party leader appears to explain how the movement plans to fraudulently pocket state funds.

“The national youth movement has never been reported for attacks on left-wing collectives, nor has it ever publicly displayed banners with extremist slogans or references to Fascism and Nazism,” Ciriani told parliament.

He brushed off a question from the centre-left Democratic Party (PD) on whether the government would “intervene to prevent Fascist propaganda”, saying the footage doesn’t necessarily constitute a legal matter.

PD deputy Michela Di Biase said her party was “dramatically concerned” by the report.

READ ALSO: Outrage in Italy over stamp honouring Fascist founder of Rome football club

“The images that we all saw are an apology for Fascism in the full sense of the term. Girls and boys who are formed in the myth of those who have stained the history of our country with blood, persecution,” she said.

Asked about the report on Monday, European Commission spokesman Eric Mamer did not mention Italy directly but condemned “Fascist symbolism”, saying “we do not believe it is appropriate, we condemn it, we think it is morally wrong”.

Although Italian law bans the apology for – or justification of – Mussolini’s Fascism, it is rarely enforced.

READ ALSO: EXPLAINED: What are Italy’s laws against support for fascism?

Meloni was a teenage activist with the youth wing of the Italian Social Movement (MSI), formed by supporters of Mussolini after World War II.

The most right-wing leader to take office since 1945, she has sought to distance herself from her party’s legacy without entirely renouncing it.

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