“This is not in the government programme,” Prime Minister Petteri Orpo (NCP) told Helsingin Sanomat.
Open image viewer
File photo of Prime Minister Petteri Orpo. Image: Lauri Karo / Yle
Prime Minister Petteri Orpo’s (NCP) government is not currently preparing to abolish the inheritance and gift tax, according to newspaper Helsingin Sanomat (HS).
HS wrote that business group the Confederation of Finnish Industries (EK), as well as a number of NCP members, have called for the abolition of inheritance and gift taxes. The paper further noted that the government has already made a number of decisions that the business and industrial sector has wanted.
The National Coalition Party, which Orpo leads, has a long-term goal of abolishing inheritance and gift taxes.
HS asked Orpo whether his government is planning to raise the issue of getting rid of inheritance and gift taxes during the remainder of its term.
“We are partly discussing this publicly, but I am only stating my own position. This is not in the government programme,” Orpo told HS, adding that his administration had already made its big taxation decisions last year.
The paper noted that easing corporate taxes was not in the government programme either, but the four-party coalition still decided to do so.
As it was working on its budget last year, the government did not reach a consensus about the abolition of inheritance and gift taxes. Doing so would have left a major dent in revenue, amounting to hundreds of millions of euros.
“In terms of the economy, no solution was found that would have been able to finance the abolition of the tax,” Orpo told HS.
However, the government did manage to ease inheritance and gift taxes, with MPs approving the reform at the end of last year.