The President of the European Parliament invoked the British legend of Robin Hood to claim the bloc needed to take cash from tax avoiding companies to subsidise aid projects in Africa.
Speaking to Italian publication Affaritaliani.it, he went on to admit the EU’s budget will suffer as a result of the UK’s decision to turn its back on the European project.
He said: ”We need more money to invest in Africa in order to reduce illegal immigration, fight terrorism, create new jobs, new infrastructure, and fight climate change.
“And the extra money that could help the EU budget is to be found in tax havens – and today is the EU Parliament debate – by taxing Google, Amazon, the other web giants, and even big businesspeople responsible of financial transactions and speculation.”
Mr Tajani, who took on the role after former President Martin Schulz stepped down to fight Angela Merkel in the German election this year, went on to claim his goal was not to harm EU business.
He added: ”All this is to decrease taxes for European citizens and businesses and certainly not to increase the tax burden.
“The EU budget will decrease because there will be no more money coming from the UK, because of Brexit, so we need more money, but not by asking it from the member states, but from taxes of those who do not pay them.
“That’s why I speak of the EU as Robin Hood.
“Let’s find out in tax havens who doesn’t pay taxes, and let’s make Google and others pay the web tax.”
Mr Tajani’s comments come after his bid to plug the Brexit budget gap with a new tax programme saw a furious response from Germany.
The senior EU bureaucrat has demanded more money for the bloc’s annual budget as Britain’s contributions leave a huge black hole in its finances.
But Germany, the EU’s most powerful member state, reacted angrily to the proposals.
Angela Merkel’s spokesperson Steffen Seibert has said the matter is “in no way on our agenda at the moment”.
A finance ministry official added said the current system of European finance was already “functional” and the emphasis should instead be on spending existing funds more sensibly.
Mr Tajani had earlier told Germany’s Funke media group: “We need twice as much money as today, so €280billion instead of €140billion per year.”
He also suggested that instead of member states doubling their contributions, the EU would levy a tax to pay for its wide-ranging initiatives and he even put forward the idea of a tax on stock market transactions to boost the bloc’s finances.
Mr Tajani said the EU would need more money to cope with the refugee crisis and the fight against terrorism, as well as to invest in failing Eurozone economies.
He also said: “Europeans must invest more in energy and digitalisation of the economy in the future” to compete with the US, China, India and Russia.”