Call for position on repeal of GST

Press, 17 October 1986, Page 4

Call for position on repeal of GST

The Minister of Finance, Mr Douglas, yesterday called on the Opposition to say exactly where it stood on the repeal of the goods and services tax. The Opposition’s finance spokesman, Mr George Gair, had 1 said a National Government would use pieces of the existing GST system in its own indirect tax to minimise disruption. “We are not interested in change for its own sake," he said. The Leader of the Opposition, Mr Bolger, has pledged to repeal GST in favour of what he has called a simpler indirect tax.

He has declined to give details of this proposed tax in advance of a party policy announcement. Mr Douglas said yesterday Mr Gair was taking a “strange middle way” over taxation, in contrast to the “nutty approach being advocated by Mr Bolger.” Mr Douglas said he could not see what mechanisms could be compatible between a retail sales tax and GST. “One approach might be to have a retail sales tax one week, and GST on the other,” he said in a statement. “The Opposition is in such a shambles it is hard to believe they have a policy at all.”