The French Government’s plan to introduce a 75pc tax on anyone earning above a million euro has been slapped down on unconstitutional. Why? The reason is because it favours two-income households over one income households.

If you think this sounds a bit like tax individualisation in this country you’d be right.

Basically, France’s Constitutional Council said the proposal by the Hollande Government breached the principle of ‘equality before public burdens.

The Council said that it penalised households where one person earns over a million compared with households where two people together earn over one million. The former household would have to pay 75pc tax at everyone above one million while the later household would not.

In France, according to reports, tax is based on household income, not individual income. It sees the household as the basic unit of taxation, not the individual.

Therefore to tax two households on the same income differently is unfair.

Our Government ought to take heed. The result of tax individualisation is that a one-income family can pay thousands more in tax each year than a two-income family on the same combined income.

Surely this is in breach of the principle of equality before public burdens?