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Imagine: the authorities are planning a specific tax reform for you personally and even ask how much you want to transfer to the tax authorities in the future.
Sounds too good to be true? Next week the State Council will discuss the federal law on the tonnage tax on marine vessels. And with this proposal, the Federal Tax Administration (FTA) has done just that. This emerges from correspondence between the tax authorities and the lobbying organization Swiss Trade and Transport Association (STSA), which Blick obtained on the basis of the public information law.
With the tonnage tax, Swiss-based shipowners will now have to pay taxes based on their carrying capacity rather than their profits. The aim is to ease the burden on shipping companies. Or, in the words of the Federal Council: “a financing instrument for transport”.
The world’s largest shipping company, Mediterranean Shipping Company (MSC), headquartered in Geneva, will benefit from this.
Tax administration relied on lobby analysis
When developing the template, management in Bern relied on information from the shipping industry, as seen in emails and documents in Blick’s possession. Tamara Pfammatter (42), who has been ESTV’s director for nearly a year, played a central role.
In January 2019, Pfammatter, then “project manager for tax policy operations”, wrote to the shipping lobby: “I saw on the STSA homepage that a study was carried out by Oxford Economics in 2017 on the importance of the shipping industry in Switzerland. This study is very relevant to our tonnage tax work.” “It will be useful. That’s why I wanted to ask you if it would be possible for you to send me this work.”
The FTA was therefore based on an analysis commissioned by the shipping lobby that overestimated rather than downplayed the importance of the sector at all.
Why didn’t the federal government conduct or commission its own completely independent study? A spokesperson for the tax administration defends this approach: “For legislative proposals, the FTA also involves bodies outside the administration that have relevant information to assist in decision-making in the political process.” To the extent that this information is referred to, this will be clearly stated in the message to Parliament.
How high can it be?
Development of the template stalled for several months. However, at the beginning of 2020, contact between ETSV and STSA became closer again. There was a meeting in March that Pfammatter attended, but this meeting was not recorded.
Shortly afterwards, on March 18, 2020, Pfammatter sent a survey to STSA about the “design” and “impact” of the tonnage tax. In this document, Pfammatter wanted to know from shipping companies in the industry which activities should be subject to tonnage tax and even asked about the desired tax rate: “How high would the assessment base have to be, given the level of tonnage?” “What are the usual tax rates in Switzerland for the regime to be competitive internationally?”
The answers came on June 2, 2020. On the question of “basis of assessment”, STSA confidently listed the “recommended rates” per 100 net tons (NT): a tax rate of 1.09 francs per ton should be applied up to 1000 NT, 0.80 francs from 1001 to 10000 NT , 0.52 francs for 10,001 to 25,000 NT and 0.26 francs for anything above that.
It is difficult for people outside the industry to understand what these values mean in practice. But the fact is that the “suggested sentences” of the maritime lobby were included verbatim in the draft bill that the Federal Council sent to parliament in 2022.
Wind from the Parliament
The FTA justifies strong consideration of the STSA proposals by saying that the tonnage tax is intended to fulfill an order of parliament from 2016 in favor of the shipping industry. At the same time, the media points out that the tonnage tax is already implemented in 21 of the 27 EU member states. “Rates per net tonnage were based on EU country averages at the time,” a spokesman said. They are therefore based on an “objective criterion” and are “averaged” in international comparison.
The National Council approved the introduction of the tonnage tax in December 2022. But the proposal now faces resistance in the Council of State.
At the beginning of 2023, the small chamber’s finance committee was still campaigning for the tonnage tax. The Economic Affairs and Taxes Commission (WAK) opposed this three weeks ago.
Among the reasons given were the “risk of revenue loss” and the “constitutionality” issue of the project. Specifically: “The Commission does not want to reduce taxes on a single sector.”
Maurer was in favor, Keller-Sutter was against
Karin Keller-Sutter (60), who has been head of the finance department since 2023, probably played an important role in this change of opinion. Unlike his predecessor, Ueli Maurer (73), under whose auspices close cooperation with the shipping lobby took place, Keller-Sutter always opposed this proposal.
In January 2022, an FTA staffer even described the Federal Bureau of Justice, then still run by Keller-Sutter, as the “No. 1 opponent” of the tonnage tax. This is shown in documents published by the magazine “Reflexion”.
This is a delicate situation for the country’s top tax official, Tamara Pfammatter: she was appointed director of ESTV by Finance Minister Maurer at the end of 2022 – probably especially for her work on the tonnage tax. His current boss, Finance Minister Keller-Sutter, is now seen as the proposal’s main opponent in Bern.
The powerful finance minister’s attitude is disturbing not only for Pfammatter. Their resistance could also lead to the tax grant for the maritime sector being canceled by the Council of State next week.
Source :Blick
I’m Tim David and I work as an author for 24 Instant News, covering the Market section. With a Bachelor’s Degree in Journalism, my mission is to provide accurate, timely and insightful news coverage that helps our readers stay informed about the latest trends in the market. My writing style is focused on making complex economic topics easy to understand for everyone.
