INCREASED TAX ON U.S. FILMS

Press, Volume LXXXIII, Issue 25272, 26 August 1947, Page 3

INCREASED TAX ON U.S. FILMS

DISTRIBUTORS’ COMPLAINT

ALLEGED RETROSPECTIVE EFFECT

(P.A.) WELLINGTON, August 25. Claiming that the Aid for Britain conference recommendation ot increased taxation on films was unfair, the secretary of the Motion Pictute Distributors’ Association in New Zealand (Mr R. M. Stewart) expressed surprise to-day that a committee containing a number of business men should have agreed to it. The film hire tax replaced the Customs footage duty payable at the time of entry of the films into the Dominion, said Mr Stewart. It was an ad valorem duty, the value of the film being the rental earned when they were exhibited in theatres in this country. The rate was 25 per cent, in the case of other than British films, after, certain | deductions. The recommendation that this tax or duty be now increased to 40 per cent, meant that films already m the Dominion and under contract for exhibition at a defined rental were to be subjected to a 15 per cent increase. The distributors brought these films into New Zealand in the belief that once they were here they would be subject ofily to the tax or ad valorem duty in force at the time, he added. “It is- definitely retrospective Customs duty or taxation.” said Mr Stewart. “In common fairness the increase, if imposed, should apply only to films not yet imported.” The British Government did not impose any increased tax on films which were in Great Britain on August 6, nor had it imposed any restrictions on the remittance to America of the earnings of such films. It had imposed a heavy tax on the value of films imported into Britain after August 6, but American companies had the right either to send their films to Britain and pay the tax or not to send them at all. Mr Stewart added that he was doubtful whether supplies of 16-milli-metre prints for small townships and tinjber and Public Works camps, for which negotiations were under way, would now be arranged.