SALES TAX BURDEN

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 11, Issue 67, 15 August 1947, Page 2

SALES TAX BURDEN

LABOUR SAVING DEVICES SHOULD BE EXEMPTED , .5* The exemption from sales tax of all labour saving devices used in the home was advocated by Mr W. Sullivan (National, Bay of Plenty) speaking in Parliament. The amount of sales tax collected in the year 1946-47 was the highest ever collected in any one year in New Zealand, and it exceeded the amount collected in the previous year by £1,852,000 he said. Last year the Minister did remove the sales tax from certain commodities, but because of the higher price level of goods sold this year there had been no effective reduction by way of sales tax. On the contrary, the total amount collected showed an enormous increase. Sales tax was embodied in the purchase of vehicles for motor transport, and when the vehicles were imported the amount of sales tax, a substantial figure, helped to increase the cost of transport, whereas an attempt to reduce the cost was overdue. An enormous amount was also collected on sales tax on motor cars. If the Government really wanted the ordinary working man to have a chance of owning a motor car it should see about reducing that taxation. It would be recalled that when the Government came into office it condemned the 5 per cent, sales tax as vicious, but instead of removing it, it jumped the amount up to 10 per cent., and later, when war broke out, to 20 per cent. It was still retaining sales tax at that level on many essential commodities.