Chamber of Commerce concerned about tax increases

A slew of taxes to be imposed to bridge the sixty million dollar plus financial gap in the budget for the upcoming fiscal year will prove to have far-flung effects on the local economy.  With the implementation of an added twenty-five percent on the existing General Sales Tax, consumers will see an increase on items that are non-exempt come April first. The commercial sector will also feel the dire effects of those measures that combined will yield a hundred and ten million dollars to government coffers. News Five Isani Cayetano sat today with the Belize Chamber of Commerce and Industry to get their perspective on the heels of a letter they sent to Prime Minister Dean Barrow on March twenty-fifth, the first day of the budget debate in the House.

 Isani Cayetano Reporting

In a letter issued to P.M. Barrow last Thursday the Belize Chamber of Commerce and Industry addressed several concerns it had with the new budget.  The Chamber was questioned why it took so long to get their views in.

Celene Cleland-Gomez

Celene Cleland-Gomez, CEO, BCCI

“One of the things that we did not want to do was to just opine on the budget without doing our research and background work to ensure that what we put out there we could stand by.  And so we had to take the time to understand what the budget was in fact saying and we also needed to consult, we are a membership organization and we had to ask our members.  Yes we would have liked more time but we did what we could do in the time we had.”

 Isani Cayetano

“I noticed that part of the research conducted by the Chamber was a survey or a sample of businesses that are currently being affected by the economic, the overall economic situation globally and locally.  Can you speak to us on how that survey was conducted and what was the general vibe coming from these business owners and the way they are being affected by the current economic situation?”

 Celene Cleland-Gomez

“Well thankful we had the foresight to do this before the budget presentation and so we had the information already collated I guess just about the day before it was presented and we did it like we usually do our surveys.  We had a sample of the members, in this case it was a hundred percent of the members that we sent an instrument to, a survey instrument asking for specific questions on the economy and we got back the responses.” 

 Isani Cayetano

“A look at this letter, basically what the first page is attributing the current state of affairs to is the fact that government expenditure has us where we currently are today.  That’s what I’m gathering from the first, actually the second page.  Can you speak to us on what brings us to this particular juncture with the Chamber saying or making that reference to an increase in government spending?”

Celene Cleland-Gomez

“Well it’s essentially it’s saying that with a look at the budget if you break it down the increases that are financed by the increases in taxes they are largely due to spending in government, government spending.  Meaning that debt financing which is the super bond [which] has been thrown about quite a bit.  It is significant but debt financing accounts for just about twenty-seven percent of the forty-seven point six percent; forty-seven point six million dollar increase over last year and that’s all we were trying to say is that spending has increased by forty-seven point six percent more than last year.”

Kay Menzies

Kay Menzies, Director, BCCI Board of Directors

“Simply the private sector can’t bear anymore costs.  We’re already in a situation as our survey showed where the private sector is sort of at a critical impasse.  It’s going to go one way or the other and the last thing that needs to be done is to shove it [in] direction by virtue of increasing the expenses of private sector operations on a whole.  There’s a lot of things to be said for that but the actual fact is that while our members are struggling to stay afloat the last thing you want to do is hand them and angle iron.”

The Senate will also meet in Belmopan tomorrow to debate the 2010-2011 budget.  Representing the business sector is Senator Godwin Hulse.

The Chambers’ Jim Scott and Amparo Masson also sat in for the interview and did not support the new tax measures.