Category: Ministry of Finance

HSF deposits

June 16, 2010 by Edmund Gall

The Hon. Minister of Finance, Mr Winston Dookeran, has reportedly claimed that no deposits were made into T&T's Heritage and Stabilisation Fund (HSF) in 2009/2010.  The ex-Finance Minister, Mrs Karen Nunez-Tesheira, has responded that Mr Dookeran's allegation was wholly inaccurate, and made some other claims regarding the HSF during her tenure as Minister.  Both statements contain inaccuracies.

As I wrote before the General Election on 24 May 2010, based on publicly available documents on the Ministry of Finance's website, the ex-Finance Minister made no deposits into the HSF from Oct 2008 to Mar 2010 inclusive. However, there were press reports during the election campaign publicising the ex-Finance Minister's approval of a deposit into the HSF.  This was confirmed by the Central Bank T&T Governor Ewart Williams on 15 Jun 2010.  So, as the ex-Finance Minister said, Mr Dookeran's allegation is false.

However, Mrs Nunez-Tesheira's statement also contains inaccuracies.  I couldn't find the unedited statement in any of the daily newspaper websites, so I've copied it from Mrs Nunez-Tesheira's Note published on facebook.  Here are the issues I've got with her response.

Firstly, she said the deposit warrant that she signed on 28 Apr 2010 'represents surplus revenues generated from oil and gas up to Quarter 2 of fiscal 2009/2010.' {Read more}

Property Tax Reform Creeps And Crawls

March 8, 2010 by Taran Rampersad

As someone who is constantly looking for information on Trinidad and Tobago's Property Tax Reform - and since we at KnowTnT.com have been keeping an eye on it and writing about it - it is somewhat humorous that there has been an announced extension on Property Tax Reform. And even some information: 

...Nunez-Tesheira also explained in the same interview that Government decided to extend the deadline for the non-payment of property tax from September 15 to December 31, for this first year.

 

’March 31 is the date by which the bills must go out and then from September 15, penalties would accrue. We expect that we would be able to send out all the property tax bills during the month of April...and since we are extending the period for payment through the month of April, we are extending the deadline for the penalty to December 31.’

 

She added that Government was collecting a lot of data coming from two systems that were running parallel to each other- the Land and Building system and the Municipal and Regional Corporation system...

'Running parallel', to an external observer, might hint at 'redundant system' - but in a country where a fair amount of houses aren't in the Land and Building system and the Municipal and Regional Corporation system can be decades behind (I know, personally) - there's a lot of work that needs to be done. And, from what I understand, the systems are incompatible since Town and Country approvals don't deal in assessment numbers or deed numbers. Seriously. {Read more}

Personal Perspective On The Trinidad and Tobago Property Tax Reform

November 20, 2009 by Taran Rampersad

When I went over the facts that were mailed out by the Ministry of Finance regarding Property Tax Reform, I immediately saw a few weak points from my own personal perspective. First, I have to give some background (without giving out too much personal information).

A Practical Look At The Old System

First, some basics. Private property (land, buildings) has an assessment number assigned to it. This is, for some idiotic reason, separate from the deed number associated with the property. To pay land and house taxes, one has to have that assessment number.

Last year, I inherited a sizable portion of land in South Oropouche. Part of it is tenanted, other areas are clear. The land was originally purchased by my grandparents; upon their deaths it was split between their 7 children. Thus the large parcel, which had one assessment number, was issued 7 different assessment numbers for the 7 different parcels of land approximately 10 years ago.

That's pretty straightforward. Where it gets complicated is when one considers the tenanted lands that my father inherited and which were then passed on to me. Thus, when the property was split seven ways with houses on the original parcel, the houses on each parcel were supposed to have been associated with their respective parcels. This was not done. It is unclear to me who was supposed to do what, whether the executors of the Will of my grandmother failed to do their jobs or whether the Board of Inland Revenue (Siparia) failed. {Read more}

Property Tax Reform Facts Provided To Citizens of Trinidad and Tobago. (Sort of)

November 19, 2009 by Taran Rampersad

The property tax reform (2009) in Trinidad and Tobago has received a lot of attention in the media, and to date there hasn't been a lot of information on it. Instead of citing specific articles, I'll just point to the smorgasbord available through Google. And while it has been very interesting to watch politicians shuffle around (Kamla Persad-Bissessar in particular) when it comes to who is doing what, the fact is that the general public hasn't gotten that much information about the topic.

All around Trinidad and Tobago this week, people have received informational brochures regarding property taxes in Trinidad and Tobago. There are 6 pages to it, not including the covers, and it seems well organized - and dare I say, informational.

Some highlights: {Read more}

• The property tax reform will be effective as of January 1st, 2010. It's unclear how this will affect people such as myself who pay their land taxes in the 6th month of the year - whether we will pay for half the year based on the new rate, or what have you.
• It is claimed that the new tax will be more equitable across Trinidad and Tobago.
• The Annual Taxable Value (ATV) is the value of the property used to calculate the property tax, and the ATV will be decided by the 'qualified professionals at the Valuation Division of the Ministry of Finance'. Buildings will be taxed based on the category of the property (executive, modern, standard, substandard and shack), the size of the property and the location of the property. The latter seems a bit tongue in cheek when it comes to the reform being 'more equitable', since part of the problem the reform claims to address is the variance in property tax between various areas.