Despite “divergent positions”, the rapporteurs of the National Assembly’s flash mission on the super-profits of oil, gas and maritime companies, announced their progress on Tuesday 4 October on France Inter. David Amiel, Renaissance deputy from Paris, invited alongside Manuel Bompard, LFI-Nupes deputy from Bouches-du-Rhône, assures that they have “worked together to conduct hearings and gather information” in order to “allow everyone to form an informed opinion on this issue”.
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On this point, “the objective of the mission” is “successful”, believes Manuel Bompard, convinced that their work now makes it possible to define what superprofits are and “to better understand how these exceptional profits are made and what are the mechanisms to put companies to work”.
Created by the new Finance Committee of the National Assembly, chaired by Eric Coquerel, this flash mission started at the beginning of September and should be completed at the end of October.
From what he calls “consensus within the European Union”, Manuel Bompard explains that “to define a superprofit, you have to take a reference period, for example between 2017 and 2019, see the average profit made by the companies concerned and see if, over the past year, the profits are at an abnormally higher level than this average”that is “beyond 20 to 25%” according to his estimates. “This allows us to enrich the proposals we make”continues David Amiel, evoking the common will of “find effective measures”.
While TotalEnergies has doubled its net profit between 2021 and 2022, the Renaissance deputy believes that the French group must be “contributed”. It also welcomes the European proposal to return part of the “superprofits” from energy producers to households and businesses. David Amiel, for whom “the priority must be neither super-taxes nor super-dividends”want more “encourage companies to invest in the ecological transition”, advocating for a “contribution commensurate with the magnitude of the extraordinary profits”. MP Renaissance also said he was in favor of “a value-sharing bonus”believing that “the priority must be to share the value with the employees”.
For his part, Manuel Bompard “remains in favor of the introduction of a tax on superprofits”. According to MP LFI, “it is a fairly elementary measure of justice to say that these extraordinary profits must be put to use for national solidarity”. Manuel Bompard recalls that he “It’s not about taxing all businesses” but those whose “the turnover exceeds 750 million euros per year”. An opinion that his co-rapporteur David Amiel does not share. Manuel Bompard pleads for “a device that could be triggered automatically” each time a company, “all sectors combined”, generates superprofits exceeding 20 to 25% compared to a predefined reference period.
In the case of TotalEnergies, which makes most of its profits abroad and pays most of its taxes abroad, and not in France where its head office is based, Manuel Bompard recommends taxing in France the profit made “including globally”. The elected LFI proposes, for example, “to establish a tax on sales (…) to ensure that part of the profit made on a global scale is taxed in France”.