The list of debtors in the reform of the General Tax Law. A question of transparency?

Abstract

One of the main problems in the current economic; social and political crisis has been financial corruption. The most recent reform of the General Tax Law has been presented as a flagship measure against this type of corruption since its Article 95.bis allows the publication of an annual list of certain taxpayers with outstanding debts to the Public Treasury which can be viewed by anyone online. Along with this measure; which will also be included in the Basque Country; other instruments have been proposed such as the publication of certain information about people who have been convicted by a final ruling of the commission of certain offences such as tax offences. These measures have been received and accepted by the general public and the media in particular without further discussion, giving the impression that they are not up for debate. However, whether the measure provided for in the General Tax Law can be questioned from the legal standpoint needs to be addressed. Such a measure may adversely affect a number of fundamental rights, notably privacy, reputation and informational self-determination. This has led to the issue of numerous reports by a number of administrations and public bodies questioning some aspects of the instrument envisaged in the Law. The possibility of publishing a list of debtors poses numerous questions that have yet to be thoroughly investigated. What is the purpose of publication? Can transparency be cited as an objective to pursue with this list? Does it disproportionately affect fundamental rights such as the right to the protection of personal data?

Keywords

• data protection
• list of debtors
• transparency
• right to be forgotten