Minister of Finance, Colm Imbert, yesterday announced that the 2024 tax and national insurance amnesties would be extended to March 31, 2025.
Imbert said the amnesties have been successful in ensuring collections, and overall compliance.
"We just extended the tax and NIS amnesties to March 31, 2025, including property tax. This will help SMEs, who are currently unable to tender to provide goods and services to public bodies due to unpaid taxes and NIS, providing them with an opportunity to rectify their situation," the minister stated in a post on X/Twitter.
Imbert also noted the Trinidad and Tobago Revenue Authority (TTRA) will become fully operational this year, and the country at large has an opportunity to become fully compliant.
“The current tax and national insuranceamnesty will allow taxpayers to put their houses in order and to pay their outstanding taxes before the TTRA is operational,” he said.
And an official statement issued by the Ministry reported that as of Monday, January 27, 2025, the tax amnesty had raised $2.38 billion in revenue.
The Ministry said compared to previous years, the current tax amnesty is now on par with the 2019, which was the most successful policy of its kind implemented in the history of T&T in terms of collections.
“It is now likely that the current 2024/2025 tax amnesty will exceed the collections in 2019,” the ministry said.
The 2019 tax amnesty raised $2.382 billion, which was almost five times the original estimate of $500 million.
The Ministry of Finance also pointed out that under the Public Procurement and Disposal of Public Property Act, which was proclaimed in 2023, Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) which are not up to date with their tax and nationalinsurance payments face significant challenges in participating in procurement proceedings by ministries, statutory authorities and state enterprises.
In this regard, said the Ministry of Finance, section 29(1)(c) of the Public Procurement and Disposal of Property Act is relevant:
“A procuring entity shall ensure that suppliers and contractors — have fulfilled their obligations to pay all required taxes and contributions in Trinidad and Tobago.”
The ministry’s release explained:
“Bearing the above in mind, both Regulation 4(3) of the Public Procurement and Disposal of Public Property (Pre-Qualification and Pre-Selection) Regulations and Regulation 10 of the Public Procurement and Disposal of Public Property (Simplified Procurement) Regulations, whilst respectively allowing payment plan agreements and a period of six months to settle outstanding tax and national insurance payments, do not absolve SMEs from their responsibility of being current with tax and national insurance payments.”
“Consequently, given the vital role of SMEs in employing people, contributing to the gross domestic product, and sustaining economic growth, it has been considered necessary to ensure that SMEs can continue participating in procurement proceedings by extending the tax and national insurance amnesty,” the Ministry said.
It added: “This would permit SMEs sufficient time to address outstanding tax and national insurance obligations.”
In delivering the 2025 budget speech, Imbert said tax amnesties over the years have proven to a valuable source of additional revenue and have generated billions of dollars in payments.
"We do not wish to encourage tax avoidance, but now that the Privy Council has ruled in the Government’s favour, with respect to the constitutionality of the Trinidad and Tobago Revenue Authority, which now allows us to move apace to populate and operationalise this new Authority, we will give taxpayers one last opportunity to put their house in order and pay up their outstanding taxes before the TTRA is in full operation, without being subject to penalties and interest," said Imbert.