BIG-TICKET ITEMS WON’T BE SPARED
NSTP POLLS REVEAL THAT MAJORITY OF NETIZENS DO NOT KNOW DIFFERENCE BETWEEN SST AND GST
THE Sales and Services Tax will be slapped on big-ticket items, says the finance minister, following the NST's frontpage report yesterday. In the report, consumer groups questioned the Customs Department’s rationale of excluding them from its list of proposed essential and non-essential items that should be taxed.
AMID the public outcry on the imposition of Sales and Services Tax (SST) and the confusion that comes with it, the Finance Ministry has shot down the waiver the Customs Department had proposed for big-ticket items under the new tax system.
The ministry says these bigticket items should be taxable under SST, come Sept 1.
“Although the list released by the Customs Department is a proposal, the Ministry of Finance is of the opinion that the SST should be imposed on the expensive and luxury items, namely big-ticket items,” said its minister, Lim Guan Eng, a day after the Customs Department issued a list of proposed essential and non-essential items to be exempted from SST.
The New Straits Times had, on its front page yesterday, questioned why these big-ticket items were in the proposed exempt list.
Among the big-ticket items listed are aeroplanes, luxury liners, passenger ferries, helicopters, spacecraft and skiing equipment.
Lim said the department was still getting public feedback on whether to include or exclude these items from the 292-page list.
He also said as a government that upheld the truth based on facts and figures, he was prepared to say that the Goods and Services Tax (GST) was perhaps more transparent and efficient than SST.
“This is because the GST has been successfully imposed on many taxpayers, including the common people, resulting in a tax collection of RM44 billion compared with RM21 billion collected under the SST.
“The excess collection of RM23 billion from GST, (however), has burdened the rakyat until it has affected their cost of living.”
Lim said the GST became more efficient and transparent when it covered 60 per cent of the Consumer Price Index basket of goods compared with only 38 per cent from SST.
He reiterated that the extra RM23 billion collected from GST would be given back to the people.
On Thursday, Lim was reported as saying in Parliament that the government hoped the RM23 billion returned to the people would spur domestic consumption as well as reassure investors’ confidence.