David Carter MP
National Party Tourism Spokesman

15 June 2006

Is Labour looking at new ‘tourism tax’?

“Tax mad Labour needs to tell the tourism industry whether it plans to consider a new ‘tourist tax’ being proposed by government-owned Landcare Research,” says National Party Tourism spokesman David Carter.

“Yes, we need to carefully manage the natural resources used by the tourism industry, but will a new tax on one of our big earning industries help, or will it just put more tourists and tourist operators off?”

Mr Carter is calling on the Government to make it clear to the industry how seriously it plans to treat Landcare’s proposals.

“The tourism industry is braced for a further slowdown and the Government’s investment in tourism was cut back in the Budget.

“Obviously industry operators are eager to know where they stand and whether Labour plans to impose new costs on them.

“Labour recently took National’s advice and rejected a blanket carbon tax. New measures to impose such a tax one industry at a time will undoubtedly require close scrutiny and inevitably meet fierce resistance,” says Mr Carter.

ENDS

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