Private Sector calls on Govt to provide emergency economic relief

…demands payroll subsidies, bailouts, tax waivers

The Private Sector Commission (PSC) has written to the National Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19) Task Force requesting consideration of a swathe of emergency economic relief measures including payroll subsidies and unemployment payments; in addition to bailouts for small businesses, a reduction of fuel prices and waivers or postponement of a number of taxes, including Value Added Tax (VAT).

The emergency measures were submitted to Task Force Chairman Moses Nagamootoo by PSC Chairman Gerry Gouveia.
Gouveia, in the PSC’s letter, said that the proposals were made “amidst concerns of the global pandemic of the COVID-19”.
Among the economic support measures being called for by the business community is liquidity support for banks and loans and financing for businesses in addition to the administrative relief on a range of statutory obligations and payments.

The PSC Chairman had prefaced the demands by pointing out to Nagamootoo that “countries around the world are grappling with the effects and taking precautionary measures to deal with the crisis which it engenders”.
Among the measures being called for by the PSC aimed at cushioning the economic impacts of COVID-19 for the average worker and citizen is for the Administration to immediately raise the threshold to accommodate no taxation for employees in vulnerable sectors who were sent off the job from $65,000 to $100,000.
This in addition to removing removal of mortgage interests and payments for the period.
The PSC also called on the Task Force Chairman to facilitate the reduction of the spread at commercial banks, “that is the difference between the lending rate and the savings rate of interest”.
Additionally, the business support organisation called for the immediate removal of VAT from all food items, detergents and all household, medical and other cleansers.
Gouveia said too that there should be the removal of VAT from essential services including data.
Among the substantive measures called for by the PSC is the temporary removal of the requirement to pay income and corporation taxes up front.

He said too that there should be “emergency funding for small businesses at risk of closure” in addition to the extending of the time to pay utility bills and hire purchase debts.
Additionally, the PSC said there also needed to be a reduction in the excise taxes on fuel.
Addressing support measures aimed at the business community specifically, the PSC Chairman said there needed to be firstly a 100 per cent deduction of taxes for items that have been given to the national COVID-19 fight by businesses.
He said too there needed to be a rescheduling of loans and mortgages in addition to the relaxing of overdraft facilities.
Gouveia said that the PSC would also like to see the relaxing of regulations in order to “classify (a) loan as non-performing”.

Speaking to broad proposals aimed at cushioning the economic effects of COVID-19, Gouveia in his missive to the Task Force petitioned for the complete removal of taxes on Personal Protection Equipment (PPE) such as face masks, gowns, gloves and other such apparatus used in the fight against the global pandemic.
He said that private hospitals should also be allowed to bring in ventilators without taxes and that labs too should be allowed to import COVID-19 testing kits “without taxes”.
The PSC Chair also said that the Task Force should consider a reduction in fuel prices by removing the tax component.
This was so that the public transportation sector could benefit, with a corresponding reduction in fares, according to Gouveia.
Additionally, the PSC Chairman said utility companies should defer payments and/or reduce by those payments by at least 50 per cent.
These among other measures proposed to the Nagamootoo chaired Task Force “would touch the mass of our population instantly”, Gouveia said.
Additionally, the business umbrella representative body called for the postponement of the filing of income and corporation taxes until the end of September “provided that the current COVID-19 situation is brought under control by then”.