Record tax ‘not written off’

Press, 22 April 1980, Page 6

Record tax ‘not written off’

PA Wellington The Prime Minister (Mr Muldoon) said yesterday that he had not entirely written off a change in the 40 per cent sales tax on records.

The record industry is lobbying, the Government for relief from the tax and was last week given an indication by the Minister of Customs (Mr Templeton) that it might be amended.’ At the week-end, Mr Muldoon said he would not take the tax off, but. at a news conference yesterday he said, “I have not written it off entirely. I have simply given a personal response.” Mr Muldoon said it was not entirely correct to say that Mr Templeton had told the record industry that the

tax would be changed- “He certainly gave no commitment.”

Mr Muldoon’s view that pop music was not culture was “ludicrous,” said a spokesman for the Record Retailers’ Federation, Mr Graham Wong, in Westport yesterday., • He asked who was going to draw the line between what was pop and what was cultural music.

Mr Wong said that U.N.E.S.C.O.’s Florence agreement in 1950 recognised that sound recordings were cultural and New Zealand was a signatory to that agreement-

He said it appeared that the Florence agreement meant nothing to the Government.