Greek Deputy Minister of Finance Nadia Valavani on Sunday announced what she called the leftist government’s “means” of tackling tax evasion in the country, a decades-old scourge that dozens of Greek governments have promised to combat.

Her interview was published in the ruling SYRIZA party’s affiliated newspaper, Avgi.

As per the latest efforts to combat tax evasion amid a growing cash crunch for the current government, she pointed to an electronic tax return statement going back 15 years for so-called “wealthy” tax-payers, while for the ubiquitous mid-level tax evasion she pointed to the online connection of cash registers with the tax bureau’s main server, as well as the expanded use of (banks’) credit cards.

For people showing less than 12,000 euros in yearly income, she promised that a tax-free regime will instituted in the second half of 2015. No question was raised by the party-affiliated paper on how to catch self-employed professionals — from private physicians to craftsmen, private tutors etc. — who don’t report income, don’t provide receipts and thus show incomes of … under 12,000 euros a year.

Among others, she said so-called “sin taxes”, such as the ones slapped on tobacco products and alcoholic beverages, are already high.