Prime Minister Gabriel Attal during a press conference on the results of the fight against fraud, at the Ministry of Economy and Finance, March 20, 2024 in Paris (AFP/Emmanuel Dunand)
Prime Minister Gabriel Attal welcomed on Wednesday “historic results” in the fight against tax and social fraud, and announced an increase in the recovery objectives of Urssaf.
“We have never tracked fraud so much,” assured the Prime Minister during a press conference in Bercy presenting the results of the fight against fraud.
“Each fraud is serious and must be tracked down,” insisted the Prime Minister, estimating that it “causes 70 million victims”. “Last year we increased tax audits by 25% and the number of tax searches increased by 30%,” he said.
“We prefer to increase the pressure on fraudsters, rather than increase taxes on the French,” launched Gabriel Attal.
In detail, tax fraud collections reached 15.2 billion euros in 2023, a record, after 14.6 billion in 2022.
On the social fraud side, “for the first time, we have exceeded the 2 billion euros mark of social fraud detected in one year”, announced the Prime Minister, specifying that “the recovery of benefit fraud has exceeded 1 billion euros and contribution fraud has also exceeded one billion euros”, “two historic records”.
The government hopes to further increase collections in the future. For this, Gabriel Attal promised on the one hand to “strengthen human resources by 2027” in tax fraud: “281 agents were recruited last year, and 350 will be in 2024”, he said. -he indicates.
On the social fraud side, the head of government wants to recruit 1,000 agents by 2027, and announced to increase the Urssaf recovery objectives (which collect social contributions) to 5.5 billion over the five-year period, compared to 5 billion previously
He is also betting on an “increase in sanctions”, “thanks to measures voted in the 2024 budget”. Since January 1, “those who incite fraud are punished by two years in prison and a fine of 30,000 euros,” recalled Mr. Attal, “And those who propose online fraud schemes are punished by five years prison and a fine of 500,000 euros.
“Each euro defrauded is a euro which will have to be paid in one way or another to finance our public services, our social model, our sovereignty”, insisted the minister, while the government seeks to reduce government spending. State to maintain its budget.
© 2024 AFP
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