BATU KURAU: The rise in goods and services in the country is not due to the implementation of the Goods and Services Tax but the result of various other factors.
Domestic Trade, Cooperatives and Consumerism Minister Datuk Seri Hamzah Zainudin said these other factors included foreign exchange fluctuations, transportation costs and other marketing aspects.
Other factors such as electricity and water tariffs as well as the high taxes property owners had to pay in “certain states” also played a role in the rise of prices of goods and services, he said.
“For instance, when water supply is not sufficient, business owners will transfer the higher costs to consumers, so this causes the price of goods and services to rise. This is what we need to know.
“GST was implemented by the government to ensure that we collect from businesses is more systematic and effective compared to the 10 per cent Sales and Service Tax (SST) which was ineffective and raised much problems for our economy,” he said after the Jualan Sentuhan Rakyat programme here.
Hamzah was asked to comment on Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak’s comment when launching the 2017 National Transformation Programme annual report that the government had wanted to implement GST in 1984 but had lacked the political will to do so.
He said more than 500 items had been zero-rated for GST, so allegations by certain quarters that it was the cause of the prices of things going up were inaccurate at best.
“We can’t say that GST is the cause of things going up in price... there are some things which are exempted from GST which have also gone up in price,” he said.
Hamzah added that all the proceeds collected by the government were channeled back to the people via initiatives such as the 1Malaysia People’ Aid (BR1M) and subsidised cooking oil, education and medical treatment.
“Actually, if you compare with the many other countries which have implemented GST, Malaysia has one of the lowest rates,” he said.