Petition for permit grants:
A precedent petition of independent organizations was recently submitted to the Supreme Court, through the Association for the Reduction of Social Disparities - The Social Home, demanding that the corona grants be returned to the state.
This is a requirement to exempt self-employed and controlling employees of a few from repaying overpaid Corona grants, as well as charging for linkage differences in respect of these payments.
Upon filing the petition, the petitioners request an urgent hearing and an interim order even before a final decision of the High Court on the petition is given.
Among the main requirements in the petition, filed by Adv. Tamar Keidar: full exemption from the requirement to return aid grants, from businesses whose annual turnover did not exceed NIS 120,000; full exemption from the requirement to return aid grants from those who closed their business or ceased business altogether In the years 2020/21; an annual examination of a decrease in the turnover of transactions and not according to a bi-monthly examination, as well as a refund of differential grants.
The petition asks the court to oblige the tax authority to set up an exceptions committee that will receive inquiries and individual objections from dealers, exempt them from the obligation to return or "establish rules that are consistent with considerations of justice, including the economic situation of dealers."
According to the petitioners, the State's demand includes the unlawful application of various sections of the Aid for Self-Employed Laws: a demand for restitution of aid grants received in excess, without legal authority, violating the right of argument and discriminating between businesses and those who received assistance Attainment and appeal;
And an unlawful retroactive change in the rate of decline required for eligibility for an assistance grant.
With regard to the additional grant, which the government automatically transferred to the self-employed in its July 2020 decision, the association claims that the demand to return it is illegal because the government has decided that in any case the businesses that received it will not be required to return it.
Recall, business owners lamented mainly the fact that they were not given any opportunity to appeal the strict and uniform criteria set.
One example they presented: a gymnastics teacher who after quarantine collected a large sum from gymnasts, at the expense of a whole year, and the amount was counted as monthly income.
According to the chairman of the Association for the Reduction of Social Disparities, Yoram Mualem, "The petition to the High Court is the last refuge of the self-employed, after the scandalous demand of the tax authority to demand the grants back." These were subsistence grants under the Human Dignity and Liberty Act, just like the employees who sat in the house and received a challah.
