“We are doing what is possible, which is recruiting, but it is certainly not solved overnight, unfortunately. We must continue this path of multi-year recruitment to allow that reinforcement,” said Secretary of State Cláudia Reis Duarte during a parliamentary hearing on the “report on combating tax and customs fraud and evasion” in 2024, submitted to parliament in June.
The Secretary of State, part of Finance Minister Joaquim Miranda Sarmento’s team, emphasized that “the aging problem of AT staff is not a problem that is exclusive” to the institution, as it is felt “similarly throughout public administration,” although it has a “special tendency” at AT due to the number of departures.
This year, she highlighted that two competitions were opened, with approximately 340 workers entering, and a mobility competition involving 116 workers was initiated, with the executive intending to launch new competitions.
“The intention remains to continue to open and maintain multi-year recruitment to address this resource limitation that the Tax and Customs Authority has,” she mentioned.
“It is a tendency that this government is trying to solve, which results from many, many, many years without recruitment,” crossing several governments, she recalled.
The government official noted that “AT has some recruitment peculiarities,” given “the high specialization and technical skill required of its staff,” and therefore, “it is not possible to recruit and have people working at AT the very next day.”
According to the Secretary of State, besides the “aging of the staff,” there is “another problem,” which is that the people who leave are “typically the most skilled and experienced.”
Cláudia Reis Duarte also stressed that new employees “must be trained” by the more experienced AT workers, and if training occurs with many new technicians at once, it also compromises AT’s mission, as the trainers detach from the “mission” of the tax authority.
“That path will continue to be followed but there is no way to do it more rapidly,” she stated.
On Tuesday, Helena Borges, the Director-General of AT, remarked at a conference at the Ministry of Finance that the tax authority has “14% fewer resources” than “ten years ago – 1,400 fewer people,” which requires the institution to have “well-defined” priorities where to act.
