The anti-fraud bill, a projet de loi initiative led by the government, was presented to the Cabinet of Ministers on March 28 and tabled in the Senate on March 30. The draft bill strengthens sanctions against fraudsters who deliberately violate the French fundamental principles of equality in public office and the State’s consent to tax. The draft bill defines the precise methods for implementing the automatic transmission of revenue generated by users of collaborative economic platforms, which comes into force in 2019. It also provides for the creation by decree of a "fiscal police" attached to the ministère de l'Action et des Comptes publics, which will place about fifty agents under the authority of a magistrate.

A raft of changes

A raft of changes to reinforce the means of sanctioning fraud are included. The draft bill permits publicising of criminal and administrative sanctions in case of serious tax evasion, introduces administrative sanctions for intermediaries who develop fraudulent arrangements to avoid taxes, revises the method of calculating criminal fines for tax evasion, extends the immediate appearance on conviction (CRPC), known as "guilty plea", to tax evasion to reduce the processing time of files, and, extends of the French list of non-cooperative states and territories ("ETNC"), "tax havens", by incorporating the list adopted by the European Union in December 2017.