The Tribune

By NICO SCAVELLA

Tribune Staff Reporter

nscavella@tribunemedia.net

DNA Leader Branville McCartney said he has “no confidence” in the implementation of value added tax by a government that “can’t even get their disclosures right”.

Mr McCartney said the government’s implementation of VAT would only allow the PLP government to “have more money to waste, to mismanage, and to use for their own benefit”.

Mr McCartney also said there was high levels of “cronyism” within the Christie administration.

“They (the government) can’t even get their disclosures right,” he said at a recent press conference. “We have persons in the government who have not disclosed. We have persons in the government like a Renward Wells, and our Prime Minister (Perry Christie) and the Deputy Prime Minister (Philip Davis) who won’t tell us about the signing of a $650 million letter of intent. You want me to trust them?

“Consider this,” he added. “Fuel prices have gone down around the world. It’s the lowest it’s ever been from 2008, and our electricity prices continue to soar. Notwithstanding this particular government said they would lower our electricity prices. And you want me to trust them with VAT and what they’re going to do?”

“Yet you’re going to put VAT on these clinics, these private clinics that people go to try and get medical care. You know what that’s going to cost? You have VAT on electricity? You think your electricity bill hard now? You wait for a couple of weeks.”

Recently, Mr McCartney has presented fairly consistent opposition to VAT, despite suggesting the need for its introduction in late 2011.

Speaking at the Bahamas Institute of Chartered Accountants in November, 2011, in which he referred to that year’s budget, Mr McCartney said as “our taxation system is not working,” the Bahamas would soon have to look at “a different form of taxation.”

He said at the time there was no way to bring further income into the country with our present taxation system. He suggested that “gradually” the Bahamas would “have to look at (implementing) value added tax within a five-year span, where we are able to bring it to the Bahamian people.”

After the Progressive Liberal Party won the 2012 general election, it announced its plans to introduce VAT as a revenue grower.

However, earlier this year, Mr McCartney urged the government to reconsider the implementation of VAT, calling the tax an “unfair, untimely, and unreasonable burden to place on the backs of Bahamians.”

Then in March, he said he would have “screamed out” against the new tax had it been presented when he was in Hubert Ingraham’s Cabinet, describing its likely affect on jobs and the economy as “very scary.”

Mr McCartney, who resigned from the former FNM government in early 2011, said VAT must have been discussed in the Ingraham Cabinet after his departure, as the issue never arose when he was at the table.

He has also accused the Christie administration of attempting to “ram VAT down the throats of Bahamians” despite providing the public with minimal information.

Last week he stood by his recent criticism of the new tax.

“I would ask the government, look, please delay this thing,” he said, “because I tell you the truth, I’m having difficulty even signing up with some businesses I’m still involved in, and when I call the people to ask them they don’t know what they’re talking about themselves.

“I have no confidence in the government regarding the implementation of a new tax regime in this country. You have cronyism galore. You’ve got corruption in this country that is perhaps at its highest level. You want me to trust them with VAT? I have a problem with that.

“The only thing they’re going to do with VAT is have more money to waste, to mismanage, and to use for their own benefit.”

VAT is set to come into effect on January 1, 2015 at a rate of 7.5 per cent.