The Courier & Advertiser (Fife Edition)
‘Amazon tax’ on web retailing to save high street
Perthshire Tory MSP proposes online purchase tax to help town centres
Online retailers should be slapped with an “Amazon tax” to save Scotland’s high streets, says Tory MSP Murdo Fraser.
The Perthshire politician blames the demise of town centre shopping on internet rivals’ lower running costs.
A low tax campaigner, he believes a levy of 2% to 5% for web purchases would help level the playing field.
The call comes after it was revealed that Amazon, which has a distribution centre in Fife, has slashed its tax bill despite increasing profits in the UK.
Mr Fraser said: “While high street stores are crippled by sky high business rates, online retailers can pay much lower rates on out-of-town warehouses.
“On top of this, despite sales of close to £2 billion, we now learn that Amazon has managed to cut its corporation tax.
“We need to back the high street, or we face the prospect of towns and cities across Scotland being disfigured by boarded-up shop fronts.”
But Ewan Macdonald-Russell, of the Scottish Retail Consortium, said: “Digital retailing isn’t the problem.
“Indeed for many long-established high street retailers, it will be the key to their future growth.
“It’s already increasingly difficult to distinguish between online and physical sales as retailers look to adopt multichannel operations.”
Amazon says it pays its full share of tax, adding one reason for the lower bill was because of a rise in share-based payments for staff.