After Parliament, it is now the turn of the Federal Council to recommend that the people reject the popular initiative “For the couple and the family – No to the penalisation of marriage”. The aim of the initiative is to establish fiscal equality between married and cohabiting couples. Indeed, as things stand, as a result of the fiscal unity of married couples and the progressive income tax rate (with the two incomes added together and taxed as a whole), as opposed to the individual taxation of cohabiting couples, married couples are heavily penalised in terms of direct federal tax. The Federal Council supports this objective but is opposed to the initiative, for two main reasons: firstly, the initiative seeks to include, in the constitution, a definition of marriage as only “a lasting and legally regulated union between a man and a woman”, thus preventing the legislator from extending marriage to couples of the same sex without introducing a further modification to the constitution. Secondly, the initiative would also grant constitutional status to the principle of common taxation of married couples, which lies precisely at the origin of the fiscal inequality between married and unmarried couples. One again, only a modification to the constitution would enable the establishment of another model of taxation. The people will decide on 28 February 2016.

The Federal Council has adopted the message concerning corporate tax law III. This reform seeks to reinforce the competitiveness of the Swiss entrepreneurial site. The aim of the reform is to abolish the special tax systems granted to holding companies, whose activities are mainly foreign-based. Read more, https://www.news.admin.ch/message/index.html?lang=fr&msg-id=57551

Lors de sa séance du 27 mai 2015, le Conseil fédéral a ouvert la procédure de consultation relative à l'accord avec l'Union européenne (UE) sur l'échange automatique de renseignements en matière fiscale. Cet accord a été signé le matin même à Bruxelles. La Suisse et les 28 Etats membres de l'UE entendent collecter des données bancaires dès 2017 et les échanger à partir de 2018, une fois les bases légales nécessaires mises en place. En appliquant la norme internationale d'échange automatique de renseignements, la Suisse et l'UE contribuent de manière déterminante à la lutte contre la soustraction fiscale. Cet accord fait partie intégrante de la politique du Conseil fédéral à l'égard des marchés financiers, politique qui est basée sur un système d'imposition conforme aux normes internationales.