Should we follow France’s example and tax the rich? HAMISH MCRAE

France’s “broader shoulders” will also have to bear the heaviest burden.

Sir Keir Starmer warned Britons just over a month ago that the richest people would have to pay more taxes, although he did not explain why pensioners would also be affected.

Now, the new French Prime Minister, Michel Barnier, best known to the British as the main negotiator for Europe on the Brexit deal, has confirmed the rumors of higher taxes in France.

For wealthy French families – those with annual incomes of more than €500,000 (£420,000) – there will be a temporary increase in income tax.

It is assumed that the duration will be one or two years. The estimated additional revenue has been estimated at €2 billion, so it’s not a lot of extra money.

There will also be an increase in corporate tax for companies with a turnover of more than €1 billion, apparently affecting around 300 companies, as well as other minor changes.

Interestingly, French pensioners are also being affected. They will begin receiving the agreed annual increase in rates next July, instead of January 1 as usual, saving the state six months of the higher payment.

The details will be announced this week, but from what we know so far, it seems that Barnier does not respect the famous fiscal rule, attributed to Jean-Baptiste Colbert, general auditor of Louis XIV’s finances: “The art of the taxation system consists of pluck the goose in such a way as to obtain as many feathers as possible with as little hissing as possible.

But there will be many whistles for few feathers. So why do it?

The answer is that France’s fiscal situation is much more complicated than ours.

Their budget deficit for the current year could reach 6 percent of GDP, while ours is just over 4 percent. Total public debt is 111 per cent of GDP, compared to 100 per cent for the UK.

Taxes are already the highest in the developed world, although that hasn’t stopped rich French people from becoming extremely wealthy.

Bernard Arnault, head of luxury conglomerate LVMH, ranks fourth on the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, with a net worth of $193 billion.

In fact, there are six Frenchmen in the top 100, while there are no Britons. (The richest Briton, Sir James Dyson, with $20.5 billion, is ranked 105.)

Naturally, the markets are well aware of the precarious situation of French national finances and have begun to charge the country more for its debt.

The likely trigger for Barnier’s action was that the yield on French 10-year government debt surpassed that of Spain, and at one point was almost as much as that of Greece.

On Friday, the rate for France was slightly below 3 percent, which while much lower than the United Kingdom’s at 4 percent, was still slightly higher than Spain’s and much higher than the from Italy. What does this mean for us here?

I can see three messages. One is that the idea of ​​a temporary tax is seductive. Some income is made and if people really believe it will be a one-off, they will not take radical measures – such as moving abroad – to avoid it.

It wouldn’t solve any long-term problems, but I imagine some clever clogs at the Treasury will propose it to Chancellor Rachel Reeves as an idea we should emulate.

The second is that the cost of servicing the national debt will become a real constraint, not only for her but for future chancellors for the foreseeable future.

It will be more like the 1950s, when the enormous debt burden of World War II weighed on every fiscal decision.

The Government had to reduce the debt, keeping the costs of servicing it low and trying to reduce the large amount.

And third, Western democracies are taxed to the limit. This limit varies from country to country. It is perfectly reasonable that if citizens want to pay more taxes for what they consider better public services, they should do so.

But France has hit limits: saying the increase will be temporary acknowledges this. I suspect we are also close to hitting the ceilings.