Bhoe warns of Property Tax unrest

Addressing a news conference at the Opposition Caucus Room of the International Waterfront Complex in Port-of-Spain, Tewarie said the measures to be imposed on the population could place further burden on an already strained economic climate.

“Because if we mismanage this situtaion of taxation at this particular point in time, you can end up with an economic recession really becoming a situation in which the country is in a total economic mess and businesses, ordinary people, people who live in their homes, people who are renting, people who have properties that are unoccupied because of the economic situation, everybody in the society is going to be negatively affected,” he told reporters.

Tewarie said the Government was focussed too much on how to raise revenue at the expense of “the people’s ability to pay in this kind of economic climate and this kind of financial challenge that people are facing.” The Caroni Central MP said given the 6.1 percent negative growth for 2016 and projections for a further decline in the first quarter of 2017, the Opposition believes it is in appropriate to impose on citizens, at this time, property tax in its existing form.

“At this time, we feel that this 2009 tax should be repealed and that we should replace it with something more reasonable and more akin to the land and building taxes which pre-dated 2009,” he said.

Tewarie said the land and building tax would generate about $150 million a year, significantly less than what the Government intends to raise with the property tax.

“But I think all the projections they have made on every tax regime and every revenue-generating measure since September 2015 have shown that none of this have been realised,” he said.

Tewarie said the Government was not properly prepared to execute the property tax. “We find it very strange that they would ask people to fill out forms and send pictures of their homes and their house plans. All of that is not in the law and we don’t understand on what basis they are asking the people to do that,” he said. “The only thing that exists in the law is that you are to fill out a form under the 2009 Act for what the property is to be used for and what is your name.

There is nothing to say you have to send a picture of your property,” he said.

Tewarie called on citizens to resist the measures being imposed.

“It is reasonable for people to say enough is enough. We will resist because what is happening is not fair or right,” he said.

United National Congress (UNC) Chairman David Lee said the party will week begin a series of public consultations, next week, informing constituents about the negative impact of the property tax. The consultations are expected to run for a period of two weeks.