Montreal (AFP)

Canada still intends to tax the digital giants but will finally wait until a decision is made at the OECD before acting, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau told Radio-Canada on Friday.

This statement marks a step back from the Prime Minister's commitment during his election campaign to impose a 3% tax on web giants, GAFA (Google, Amazon, Facebook and Apple), from April 1st.

"We will wait for the report this summer" from the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), said Trudeau in an interview with the public channel.

"We were committed to doing it during the election campaign, we will do it. For the timing, we are thinking," he added.

"We want to be aligned with the OECD," said Trudeau, while his Minister of Canadian Heritage (Culture), Steven Guilbeault, said Monday he wanted to act "very quickly" in this matter.

"We do not necessarily want to go too far, too quickly, as France has done a little," defended Mr. Trudeau.

"We will do it responsibly," he concluded.

In early December, the Trump administration threatened to overtax "up to 100%" the equivalent of $ 2.4 billion of French products in response to the introduction in France last summer of a tax on giants digital.

This "Gafa" tax creates a tax on the turnover of large companies and not on their profit, often consolidated in countries with very low taxation such as Ireland or Luxembourg.

© 2019 AFP