“We
take pride in knowing we are an administration that listens”
Minister of Finance,
Dr. Peter Phillips closing comments in the 2014-2015 Budget Debate in the House
of Representatives w.r.t. the withdrawal of the ATM Withdrawal Levy on Wednesday
April 30th 2014
Looks
like the powers-that-be weren’t feeling the ATM Bank Withdrawal Tax as
described in my blog
article entitled “Min.
of Finance, Dr. Peter Phillips to implement ATM Withdrawal Tax - Jamaica's
Unbanked means Cashless Society coming with Digicel Mobile Money”.
Instead
they, the Commercial and Private Banks, Lending Institutions and Investment
Firms, decided to use their Big Stick hold over the Minister of Finance, Dr.
Peter Phillips, to force him to withdraw this very controversial Tax. At least
that’s what the Cartoon suggests really happened!
 |
This
as he’s now withdrawn the ATM Withdrawal Tax (or Levy if you prefer!) and has
decided to replace it instead with two alternatives as explained in “Bank withdrawal
tax proposal withdrawn”, Published Wednesday April 30, 2014 4:14 pm by
Daraine Luton, Senior Staff Reporter, The
Jamaica Gleaner.
With
regards to the “big stick”, I’m of course referring to the Banks and Investment
firms, many of which have members of High-society who are Board Members or have
a deeper interest in their profitability. Apparently they reminded the
Government of their Loan obligations as well as money they were owed and
possibly may have threatened all-out legal action along with other form of
action.
And
what are those two measures? They are as follows:
1. 15%
tax on all insurance premiums paid by Jamaican residents to non-residents
2. 16.5%
GCT being applied to imported Services
There
an Alcoholic Beverage Tax that coming and other Gory Details relating to a
removal of the Tax on Hybrid Motor Vehicles, something about which I’ve written
about as being necessary as stated in my blog article entitled
“Minister
of Justice Mark Golding Environmental Policy changes to Vehicle Importation -
All-Electric Vehicles and Flex-Fuel Vehicles put Used Car Dealers on The Guilt
Trip”.
In
more good news too, custom duties on Phablets has been removed as stated in “No Custom Duties on Phablets”,
published April 22, 2014 By Alecia Smith-Edwards, The
Jamaica Information Service. So that’s good news for those obsessed with
the super-large smartphones as stated in my blog article
entitled “Samsung
Galaxy Note III is an excellent alternative to the Apple iPhone - Phablet
competition from the HTC One Max and the Sony Xperia Z Ultra signals long
lasting trend”.
I’m
not interested.
What
has me personally upset is that the GOJ just threw away the perfect opportunity
to not only tax the SUV Driving wealthy in Jamaica but also to usher in Mobile
Money, making it mandatory and Cash Transactions illegal.
This
2014/2014 Sectoral Budget Debate has certainly been Dramatic!
No comments:
Post a Comment