Serpico, the acronym for “Servizi per i Contribuent” {Services for the taxpayers}. Is a Sogei application to check up on the accounts of the Italians? Sogei is a computing company that went from Telecom Italia to the Ministry of the Economy in 2002. The information relating to us will be in a million billion bytes of memory. Two thousand servers handling 22,000 items a second. Thanks to this firepower, every single transaction of the accounts of us Italians will be examined. Every item paid in, every bank transfer, will have to have its reason, the motives. This will be possible from 01 January 2012 when all current accounts will be available to the Tax authorities even without on-going investigations. The Italian Republic of the Soviets. The Great Tax Dodgers don’t transit through a current account. The Great Corruptors don’t do bank transfers. Anyone who has made use of the Fiscal Shield did not arrange for the bank to make a payment of 100 million euro to a foreign account.
Who wants to be checked up on? The baker, the pensioner, the artisan, the small-scale entrepreneur-soon-to-commit-suicide because the State doesn’t pay his invoices? And how much is Serpico costing us in a State where broadband is a measure for trousers while the State is investing in hundreds of new servers?
The transactions on our current account are a snapshot of our lives: payments for the school, for holidays, a loan to a friend, the annual season ticket for public transport, the restaurant by the house. Us and our current accounts are the same thing. The knowledge that my identity, as an honest taxpayer, is available to tens or hundreds of people doesn’t feel good to me. It’s a violation of privacy. Who can assure me that my personal data will not be violated? The relationship is no longer between me and the bank but between me and the Tax authorities. Does one have to give an explanation of a bank transfer for 1200 euro to one’s own uncle? We are slowly sliding towards the total control of the life of the citizens. The reason given is that we are close to bankruptcy, that we have to save Italy. Good! Let those who have brought us to this situation, starting with the parliamentarians, publish on the internet the transactions on their current accounts for the last five years. Let every member of the public administration that has got the citizens into debt, give back the money. Then there’s a question to be asked. What’s the use of our taxes if public services are disgusting and the few that function are chopped to pieces with cuts? If I pay I want to be served and respected. The master in this country is the citizen, not a Government of bankers that are not even elected. They will never give up (but is it in their interests?). Neither will we.