Portugal’s National Data Protection Commission (CNPD) has rejected a Socialist government key proposal in its 2016 State Budget that would have enabled the taxman to receive details of everyone’s bank account balances.
The CNPD decided that the Government clearly would be acting against the rights of Portugal’s citizens if the State gave itself the power to know what is in citizens' bank accounts and the move would damage constitutional rights.
The proposal had been included in the 2016 budget under the catch-all phrase ‘to fight tax evasion’ but the Commission stated that knowing people’s bank balances would not be much help at all and disproportionately would invade privacy.
The last Socialist government under jailbird José Sócrates already had chiselled away at citizens’ rights by making it the taxpayer’s role to prove he was tax compliant, rather that the State proving he was not.
Since 2009, anyone failing to file a tax return can be investigated and their bank accounts delved into. Transfers of money from Portugal to a foreign country now is treated as highly suspicious and an alert sent to the Bank of Portugal.
The Passos Coelho government was no less assiduous when in 2015 it tore up much of the banking secrecy legislation by passing laws giving the tax department access to details of citizens’ pension funds, insurance policies and other financial products which previously were private, unless a court ruled otherwise.
Whether the current government will review and appeal the CNPD’s decision remains to be seen but the continuing intrusion of the State into the financial lives of its citizens is unlikely to abate.
‘Tax fraud’ and ‘international terrorism’ are the two most popular excuses used by the State to get its hands on the maximum amount of citizens’ data and history shows us that governments cannot be trusted with such information.
