The price of a gallon of premium fuel passed the nine dollar mark one week ago. That’s a long way off from March of this year when the one dollar gas tax was introduced. At that time, the price of a gallon of gas hovered around six dollars. At the time of implementing the tax – which came at the end of a year when pump prices had fallen to their lowest in a decade - the Prime Minister said, that if prices go too high, “it is my promise that we would then come back and take off as much of this dollar increase as would put things back in alignment for the Belizean people.” Well, for those keeping score at home, that’s one promise you can scratch off your list, because with the economy in a nosedive the Prime Minister today made it official, it’s not happening.
Hon. Dean Barrow,
“I certainly cannot see myself in the present circumstances going back to the House to lower our taxes in this area, not in terms of this situation.”
Jules Vasquez,
“You said you would.”
Hon. Dean Barrow,
“I believe I said I would revisit. You revisit, you revisit, and then you determine whether in the circumstances if you could afford to come back. As I said when you earlier made the point, I am not here to play word games. I accept that the spirit of the thing was that once it reached a certain point I would go back to lower the flat tax. In the circumstances I can’t, not given what’s happening with revenue collection in this country.”
With world fuel prices dipping slightly, the Prime Minister says he expects that pump prices should drop with the next shipment.
