Thursday 3rd May 2001 Richard Prebble Media Release -- Economy

The best way the government can simplify tax for small businesses is to cut their tax rate, ACT leader Richard Prebble says.

Responding to the government’s tax simplification proposals for small business released today, Mr Prebble said a better move would be to immediately lower the company tax rate by at least three cents in the dollar.

That would bring New Zealand into line with Australia where the company tax rate is due to fall to 30 cents on July 1.

It would be even better to undercut Australia’s company tax rate to give New Zealand a competitive advantage.

“Given that New Zealand is the last bus stop on the planet, we need a lower tax rate than Australia to encourage business,” he said.

As well as Australia, several other OECD countries have recently cut business tax rates, including Canada, Denmark, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy and Portugal.

“Centre-left governments throughout the OECD have been leading the way in cutting tax rates during the past few years,” Mr Prebble said.

“In contrast, the New Zealand government raised the top personal income tax rate to 39 cents in April last year. New Zealand is one of the few OECD countries, if not the only one, to implement such an increase in recent years.”

ENDS

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