A judicial setback for Isabel Díaz Ayuso that also represents a defeat before the Government of Pedro Sánchez. The protection that the Constitutional Court gave to the tax on large fortunes that the Government approved last year has forced the popular leader to recover the wealth tax, one of the taxes that are the paradigm of the fiscal policy defended by the president of the Community of Madrid. So much so that Galicia and Andalusia, two communities in the hands of the PP, followed the steps inaugurated by Esperanza Aguirre two decades ago.. From the Ministry of Finance, they do not hide their joy at what they consider a “political victory”.

Díaz Ayuso was ahead of Juanma Moreno in the court battle against the tax on the rich, despite the fact that María Jesús Montero announced the creation of this tax after the Andalusian announced his bonus in assets. The tax is designed to collect from fortunes exceeding three million euros. With that objective, it collected 623 million, according to the data that the Ministry of Finance made public last September, with the settlement of a tax that is intended to be made permanent, as established by the agreement between the PSOE and Sumar to form a new Government.. Most of this collection occurred in the Community of Madrid and, to a lesser extent, in Andalusia and Galicia..

On Tuesday, in the Senate, Montero criticized Díaz Ayuso for now trying to manage something that he had “demonized”. According to the popular leader, it had a confiscatory objective and also invaded the powers of the autonomous communities.. The latter is relevant, since the argument used by the Madrid Government is that the new rate overlapped with the wealth tax, transferred to the autonomous communities.. This transfer is precisely what allowed the Executive of the Community of Madrid to bonus it to 99%, that is, eliminate it de facto. That is why it was striking that Díaz Ayuso, after the setback of the Constitutional Court, announced that he intended to demand the management that he had previously criticized..

The obstacle for Díaz Ayuso's plans is that the new tax is state and the Government of Pedro Sánchez has no intention of transferring it to the communities of the common regime. Euskadi, which has its own tax regime, like Navarra, demanded its management at the beginning, but the idea has been frozen. This blockade only left one way out for the Madrid president and she revealed it on Wednesday in the Assembly. His intention is to reactivate the wealth tax whose elimination he was calling for, which the Ministry of Finance and Public Function considers a “success from a political point of view” after the offensive of the popular baroness through the Constitutional Court.

But the celebration in the department of Montero does not stop there, since they defend the “technical success” that the failure of the Community of Madrid's appeal represents.. Those responsible for preparing the tribute had to work hard to avoid this overlap with heritage, something they have achieved with their victory in the TC. “And it is also a success in the sense of fiscal avant-garde at an international level,” they explain from the Treasury, despite the fact that the income has remained at 58% of the initial forecast, estimated at 1,500 million euros.. In total, 12,000 taxpayers (0.1% of the total) paid the tax with an average fee of 53,000 euros.

The fight with Sánchez

The so-called tax on the rich is one of the main fronts between the Community of Madrid and the Government of Pedro Sánchez. In addition to the judicial battle, Díaz Ayuso promoted a tax deduction for investors from abroad, of up to 20% of the amount disbursed in personal income tax, conceived as a “counterweight” to the tax promoted by the Government.

The starting point is now similar. The law announced by the popular president, which will be registered in the Assembly in the coming weeks, aims to collect again from the large assets registered in the Community of Madrid and then revert it to the taxpayer in new tax reductions, although the regional Executive has not detailed even if there will be any measure in that sense, apart from those already presented.

Ayuso's plan involves reactivating the regional tax for assets exceeding three million euros, the same limit established by the state standard.. That is, in no case does it free the taxpayer from that payment, but it simply goes to the coffers of the Community of Madrid and not the State.. “We are not going to stand still,” said the regional president herself this Tuesday, after announcing the measure. The question now is to specify how it intends to reverse the tax increase that, de facto, will occur when the patrimony tax is reactivated..

In Sol, they have been focused on torpedoing the tax for months. The Community of Madrid considers that this and other Pedro Sánchez policies are a threat to growth and job creation. According to calculations by the Ministry of Economy and Finance, headed by Rocío Albert, they estimate that it would have a negative impact on investment of up to 1.2 billion euros. If they recover it now, it is because they assure that 90% of what is collected is done in the Community of Madrid and, therefore, it is preferable to manage it directly and then be able to return it, although that idea has remained in the air and represents a step backwards with respect to to the commitment to suspend assets that he defended until now.