18/03/21

BARBADOS: Level tax playing field coming, according to Toppin.

As published on barbadostoday.bb, Wednesday 17 March, 2021.

The distinction between international business companies and domestic firms in the payment of corporate tax to Government is to officially end in three months, Minister of International Business Ronald Toppin has revealed.

As the House of Assembly considers the 2021/2022 Estimates of Revenue and Expenditure, he told lawmakers that by June 30, the Mottley administration will completely close the taxation gap between these two types of business operations.

Toppin said: “We have already revised our corporate tax structure. We have converged our corporate tax rates [for] domestic and international business companies. We have brought the tax rate down to a rate that is more found in the international business sector which is between 5.5 per cent corporate tax at the top and one per cent at the bottom.

“We have therefore offered a reasonable rate of tax to all persons establishing companies in Barbados. We have abolished any distinction between international companies and domestic companies.

“We were forced to deal with what was being labelled harmful tax practices with our various international business regimes.

“And rather than dodging bullets all the time and jumping through hoops and hoping for the best… we decided to converge our tax rates, there can be no possible argument that there are any distinctions among entities.

“On June 30 this year, that process of tax convergence will be complete when all entities that opted to be grandfathered when we brought all the legislation in place by December 2018… will cease being grandfathered by June 30… and all companies thereafter will be genuinely called domestic entities.”

And as the administration continues its efforts to be removed from all negative lists of the European Union (EU) and the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), the minister declared Barbados a well-regulated jurisdiction that is committed to excellence in its operating ideals.

“We intend to remain a very well-regulated jurisdiction, that takes our compliance with international standards, very seriously,” he said, lamenting that Barbados had to endure being “unfairly blacklisted” by the EU and was doing all that was necessary to ensure it did not recur. (IMC1)