Tax break: No new taxes in 2011 Budget, says Sinckler
Friday June 17 2011 | 01:49 AM

BARBADIANS will not be called upon to pay higher taxes during the forthcoming Budget.

This, as a three per cent growth rate is being projected for next year.

Finance Minister, Christopher Sinckler, has given this assurance of a tax-free Budget while speaking on the way forward for the economy. The Budget is expected to delivered in the House of Assembly before Kadooment on August 1.

However, the Minister did not say whether there will be an ease to some of the taxation which featured in the Budget of November 2010. 

However, he did say that where it is possible to give some relief, that will be done. “But we are not anticipating any tax-raising measures,” according to him.

On the occasion of the November 2010 Budget, Sinckler had increased, among other things, the Value Added Tax and excises on gasoline, and eliminated travel and entertainment allowances. He also discontinued the Environmental Levy. While not setting a date for this year’s Budget, the Minister said that it could come some time next month. “It will be in a few weeks time,” he said, noting he will be awaiting the Parliamentary Calendar.

The Minister said that Government has been holding stakeholder consultations with various interest groups. Meetings have already been held with the Barbados Manufacturer’ Association, the Barbados Small Business Association, the Bankers’ Association of Barbados and the Barbados Chamber of Commerce and Industry.

According to to him, everybody is expressing confidence in what is taking place. One of the strategies the Government intends to revisit is a scheme to pursue a targeted investment programme of which the late Prime Minister David Thompson had spoken in 2008. 

“We will be looking at that going forward with that. Other things, like looking at the BNB shares, will also be looked at,” he added.

In his address to a function of the Royal Bank of Canada on Wednesday evening, Sinckler zeroed in on the latest Standard and Poor’s report issued that same day, noting that the rating agency had expressed confidence in Barbados’ ability. 

He said the agency had reaffirmed Barbados’ rating and gave “a stable outlook for Barbados’ economy in which they project a two per cent growth this year and three per cent next year and in which they expressed confidence in Barbados’ ability to manage its debt, consolidate its fiscal account and generally return the island to the levels of stability to which we have become internationally known.”