RAD­HI­CA DE SIL­VA

rad­hi­ca.sookraj@guardian.co.tt

Busi­ness own­ers say while they wel­come the Gov­ern­ment’s plan to make $1.6 bil­lion avail­able for Val­ue Added Tax (VAT) re­funds, they be­lieve there should be a de­fer­ral of prop­er­ty tax this year, as many en­tre­pre­neurs are strug­gling to pay their bills.

Speak­ing to Guardian Me­dia short­ly af­ter Fi­nance Min­is­ter Colm Im­bert pre­sent­ed the Mid-Year Bud­get Re­view in Par­lia­ment on Mon­day, Greater San Fer­nan­do Cham­ber of In­dus­try and Com­merce pres­i­dent Ki­ran Singh said the re­im­burse­ment of VAT re­funds was wel­come news. How­ev­er, he said is­sues of in­fla­tion, the ris­ing cost of liv­ing and a de­fer­ral of prop­er­ty tax should have been ad­dressed. 

“We were dis­ap­point­ed that prop­er­ty tax will come on stream. We had hoped for a de­lay in prop­er­ty tax. We are aware that prop­er­ty tax is an in­come-gen­er­at­ing tool and is nec­es­sary to cov­er ex­pens­es but we are now com­ing out of the pan­dem­ic and we have now start­ed to flex and sta­bilise. Prop­er­ty tax is an un­fore­seen ex­pense that we haven’t catered for. This will put a strain on the busi­ness econ­o­my,” Singh said.

He not­ed that a $100 mil­lion tranche for sec­ondary road re­pairs was wel­come news, as de­plorable roads im­pact­ed neg­a­tive­ly on busi­ness growth.

Singh al­so said the dig­i­tal­i­sa­tion of lo­cal gov­ern­ment ser­vices was long over­due. 

“We need to­tal digi­ti­sa­tion of all gov­ern­ment ser­vices and im­prove­ment of the ease of do­ing busi­ness. The cost of liv­ing is cause for con­cern and the food im­port bill is very high,” he added.

It was al­so com­mend­able that the Gov­ern­ment was us­ing mon­ey from the Con­sol­i­dat­ed Fund, rather than bor­row­ing to spend, he added. 

The Gov­ern­ment is seek­ing ap­prox­i­mate­ly $3.08 bil­lion in sup­ple­men­tary fund­ing for fis­cal 2022 to pay out­stand­ing monies owed to con­trac­tors, and jan­i­tors, pay VAT re­funds, dig­i­talise lo­cal gov­ern­ment, ex­e­cute road re­pairs and de­silt­ing of wa­ter­cours­es, as well as to pay pen­sion­ers and pub­lic ser­vants. 

“When the min­is­ter says VAT re­funds will be giv­en a high­er pri­or­i­ty, we ex­pect this will add to the cash flow of busi­ness­es that have been lan­guish­ing. Right now, we have dif­fi­cul­ty meet­ing the util­i­ty bills,” he said.

He al­so not­ed that pay­ment of ar­rears owed to jan­i­tors, se­cu­ri­ty com­pa­nies and main­te­nance work­ers will as­sist small com­pa­nies in stay­ing afloat. 

Mean­while, Con­fed­er­a­tion of Re­gion­al Busi­ness Cham­bers co­or­di­na­tor Jai Lelad­hars­ingh agreed in­fla­tion sta­tis­tics should have been pro­vid­ed.

“In­fla­tion is dan­ger­ous to our econ­o­my and we want­ed to hear more on this. What I want­ed to hear is what is be­ing done to bol­ster agri­cul­ture and our food se­cu­ri­ty. What is go­ing to be done to re­vive the tourism sec­tor both in Trinidad and To­ba­go,” Lelad­hars­ingh said.

San Juan Busi­ness As­so­ci­a­tion pres­i­dent Vivek Char­ran told Guardian Me­dia that while VAT re­funds and pay­ments to con­trac­tors could be a stim­u­lus to the econ­o­my, this can on­ly make sense if re­funds are paid prompt­ly.

He said prop­er­ty tax was com­ing this year and peo­ple should make the nec­es­sary ad­just­ments to ac­com­mo­date the tax, see­ing that it had al­ready been de­ferred be­fore.

“I was hop­ing to hear that they may have re­duced tax­a­tion on car parts to take the edge off the pe­tro­le­um bill. I al­so hoped they would give more con­ces­sions for hy­brid and elec­tric ve­hi­cles, so we can move away from fos­sils,” he added.

Char­ran al­so said crime re­mains an is­sue that must be ad­dressed. 

Mean­while, pres­i­dent of the Ch­agua­nas Cham­ber Richie Sookhai said busi­ness­es have been suf­fer­ing, not­ing, “The Gov­ern­ment should not im­ple­ment the prop­er­ty tax now to cre­ate more hard­ship for peo­ple.”

Sookhai said the VAT re­funds will put mon­ey back in­to the pock­ets of the busi­ness own­ers. How­ev­er, he not­ed that ad­di­tion­al in­cen­tives should have been pro­vid­ed to medi­um and small en­tre­pre­neurs, who could go out of busi­ness be­cause of dis­rup­tions in the glob­al sup­ply chain.

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