Italy's Salvini says government won't introduce any new tax

[June 12, 2019]  MILANO (Reuters) - Italian Deputy Prime Minister Matteo Salvini said on Wednesday that the government wanted to be able to cut taxes, ruling out it could raise the sales tax or introduce any tax on wealth or savings.

"We're not asking Europe for money ... what we ask for is to be able to cut taxes for Italians," Salvini said in a video posted on Facebook.

"We definitely won't introduce new taxes, we won't increase the value added tax, we won't introduce a wealth tax, we won't touch Italians' bank savings," he added. "We want to free up resources".

The Italian press on Wednesday reported Italy may tax cash and other valuables stashed in banks, quoting Salvini as telling a late-night TV program that safety deposit boxes in Italy held assets worth hundreds of billions of euros.

(Reporting by Elisa Anzolin, editing by Valentina Za)

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