31 August 2021

Press statement by MCA Spokesperson Saw Yee Fung

 

GST should only be reinstated after economy recovers, and with several considerations




The Small and Medium Enterprises Association (SAMENTA) recently called for the reintroduction of the Goods and Services Tax (GST). Adding to their suggestion, we believe the GST can be improved with a few tweaks and adjustments, and the reinstatement should only be done after the economy has recovered.

Out of all 195 countries in the world, there are 160 which impose GST or a similar tax. This shows that it can be an effective, fair, and transparent tax system.

Regardless, the immediate focus now is fighting the pandemic and reviving the economy; It would be putting the cart before the horse if GST is introduced before getting the people’s lives back on track.

In addition to that, some considerations should be made to prevent applying too much pressure to the people’s lives:

1) Reduce GST rate from 6% to 3%;

2) Simultaneously introduce anti-profiteering laws to prevent unscrupulous sellers from using GST as an excuse to raise goods prices;

3) Reinstatement of GST should allow reuse of the previous system to prevent incurring extra charges;

4) The tax rebate system should be improved especially in terms of timeliness. The government could even consider a “rebate first, review later” strategy, considering that the slow pace was a big reason that led to investors facing problems with their cash flow.

 

Saw Yee Fung
MCA Spokesperson

-MCA Online-