Uproar vs Italy’s draft tax on migrants

Inquirer.net Agence France-Presse
First Posted 22:48:00 01/10/2009

ROME, Italy -- Proposals by Italy's anti-immigration Northern League to charge immigrants 50 euros (67 dollars) for residency permits and require a 10,000-euro guarantee to set up a business sparked a furor on Saturday.

Parliament speaker Gianfranco Fini, head of the right-wing National Alliance, distanced himself from the proposals, calling them "discriminatory," while opposition leader Walter Veltroni said they "smacked of racism."

The proposals are contained in amendments to a draft bill before parliament on measures to address the economic and financial crisis.

Renato Farina, a lawmaker in Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi's People of Freedoms party, called on his Northern League ally to withdraw the amendments, while his colleague Fabio Granata called them a "tax on despair."

Cabinet under-secretary Carlo Giovanni said the government was not associated with the initiative, saying there was a difference "between being unable to extend to non-EU residents all the rights enjoyed by Italians and levying heavier charges on those who already have low incomes."

Some 225,000 of Italy's 3.46 million businesses are owned by non-EU citizens, according to a study by Italy's leading daily Corriere della Sera.

The number of Italian-owned businesses declined by 29,970 in 2007 compared with 2006, while that of foreign-owned businesses rose by 16,654, the study found.

Berlusconi enjoys a comfortable majority in parliament thanks to his alliance with the anti-immigration Northern League, which doubled its strength to more than eight percent in last year's April elections.