By NEIL HARTNELL
Tribune Business Editor
nhartnell@tribunemedia.net
The Government is still moving too slowly for the private sector’s liking in clearing the “last remaining cobwebs” surrounding unresolved Value-Added Tax (VAT) concerns.
Gowon Bowe, the Coalition for Responsible Taxation’s chairman, told Tribune Business that the VAT Department was still addressing business issues on an individual, case-by-case basis rather than adopting a “holistic” approach.
The Coalition is seeking a comprehensive response to its ‘Consolidated List’ of all the private sector’s unresolved VAT concerns, which was submitted to the Government in late December 2014.
Emphasising that the list was “not daunting”, Mr Bowe said he was gaining the impression that the VAT Department was “resource challenged” in developing a comprehensive response given its continued insistence on a “piecemeal, ad hoc” response.
“It’s still too slow,” Mr Bowe replied, when asked by Tribune Business about how much progress had been made in addressing outstanding private sector concerns.
“We’ve got correspondence back from the VAT Department with respect to a handful of matters, and we fired a response back to John [Rolle]. We don’t want to deal with them on a piecemeal, case-by-case, ad-hoc basis.”
The Tax Coalition chief added: “Until it’s dealt with in a holistic manner, it’s still not the progress the private sector would like to see from the VAT Department.
“The longer time goes on, the less confidence the private sector has that it will be done in a holistic manner as opposed to an ad-hoc manner. We’re still encouraging them [the Government] to understand the importance of it to the business community, even if it’s an exercise on paper as opposed to true changes.”
The private sector’s comprehensive list of outstanding Value-Added Tax (VAT) concerns reflected unresolved issues for many industries, ranging from financial services to the auto dealers sector.
John Rolle, the acting VAT Comptroller, confirmed to Tribune Business last week that the Government’s approach was still to deal with matters as they arose on an industry or individual business basis.
“We are continuing to have dialogue with industry groups and businesses one:one, in which we give them responses on issues,” Mr Rolle confirmed.
This is not the approach favoured by the private sector. Mr Bowe told Tribune Business: “What I am deducting from it is that they are resource challenged, and spending a lot of time dealing with micro business matters as opposed to macro matters.
“They need to understand the importance of it, and need to free up resources with respect to it. Make it very clear how the VAT Department addresses and interprets these matters, and set our Rules and governance notes.
“This is more an administrative exercise. Until we have that [comprehensive response], it’s a bit difficult to clear these last remaining cobwebs,” the Tax Coalition chairman added.
“It’s not a daunting list and should be easily dealt with. If they have the responses to it, they should be able to articulate them, and it becomes evidence in the record as to how things are dealt with.”
Comments
Economist 9 years ago
If the business sector is not happy they can, do what other business sectors do in other parts of the world do. Take the government to court and force change. That is what Branson did, for example, and he won.
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