‘No directive yet on Tourism Tax’

GEORGE TOWN: The Penang government has yet to receive a directive regarding the mechanism to collect Tourism Tax.

State Tourism Development Committee chairman Danny Law said the collection of the tax was under the purview of the federal government.

He said the state will focus on the collection of the Penang Local Government Fee, which has been renamed “Hotel Fee”.

“We will continue to collect the Hotel Fee although Tourism Minister Datuk Seri Nazri Abdul Aziz had said states should stop collecting accommodation-based fees in view of the Tourism Tax, which will be implemented in July,” he told a press conference yesterday.

On another matter, Law said the Penang Forward Sports Club will be sending nine runners to the Australian Gold Coast Marathon on July 2.

Meanwhile In IPOH, Perak Tourism, Arts, Culture, Communications and Multimedia Committee chairman Datuk Nolee Ashilin Mohamed Radzi said the federal government should allocate Tourism Tax revenue to state governments based on the number of registered hotels or inns, rather than overall distribution according to each region.

She said this was because the distribution of Tourism Tax should be returned to the state governments based on the total tax collection in the states.

“For example, the number of hotels registered in Perlis is small, so when the Tourism Tax is distributed on average following each region, it will not be fair to states with more hotels or inns,” she told reporters after attending a gathering with Perak Tourism Industry activists yesterday.