Senator Don Wehby, Minister without Portfolio in the Finance Ministry - File

Government has set up a tax reform committee whose mandate is to review and analyse previous studies, Senator Don Wehby said Thursday.

The committee's findings will inform a 'comprehensive' tax reform package to be implemented in the 2008/09 fiscal year.

The body will review the Matalon Committee report and recommendations of 2004 as well as the Private Sector Organisation of Jamaica's position paper on tax reform.

The group will also look at ongoing work by the Inter-American Development Bank.

"In addition, the committee has been asked to include in their individual reports, recommendations on reforming customs and improving tax administration," said Wehby, Minister without Portfolio in the Finance Ministry, speaking in Montego Bay at a developers' conference.

Associate in the law firm, Myers, Fletcher and Gordon (MF&G), Sanya Young, is seen here addressing the monthly MF&G Jamaica Conference Board Wednesday morning seminar held November 28, at MF&G's offices, East Street, Kingston. Young, the featured presenter on 'Intellectual Property and Branding in the Corporate World', said the world's 100 most valuable brands, headed by the Coca-Cola trademark, were valued at US$67 trillion. If strategically managed, she said, intellectual property - such as logos and trademarks, packaging, designs, copyright and patents - may represent a may represent a company's most valuable capital asset. Beside Young is MF&G partner Peter Goldson.

Mum on names

While not divulging the names of the committee members, Wehby said he expected the joint report from the committee, whose members are drawn from both the public and private sectors, by December 7.

However, Sunday Business has learned that the group is being chaired by the ministry's financial secretary, Collin Bullock, and has members such as Paul Lai, deputy financial secretary, and Errol Hudson, director general for tax administration.

It also includes Joseph Matalon, who led the last tax reform task force put together by former Finance Minister Dr. Omar Davies, said Sunday Business sources, as well as Betty Ann Jones Kerr, tax partner, KPMG; Allison Peart, managing partner at Ernst and Young; Dayle Blair, principal/managing partner, Global Accounting, Auditing and Tax Services; and Wilfred Baghaloo of PricewaterhouseCoopers.

The committee as been instructed to take the February 2007 'Jamaica: Review and Proposed Strategy for Tax and Customs Administration Reforms' as the basis for their discussion and analysis.

Wehby, who was specially recruited by the Bruce Golding administration to turn around the country's fiscal performance, said at the conference that it was important for Jamaica to have a sound, predictable macroeconomic policy framework that maintains low inflation, a stable exchange rate and competitive interest rates.

But he acknowledged that the country's situation remained tenuous.

"During the September quarter, a number of developments have derailed the stability that was observed in the earlier months," he said. "These factors have contributed to increased volatility in the foreign exchange market and upward pressure on interest rates.

"As a corrective measure, the Bank of Jamaica has been pursuing a policy of tight monetary policy which is expected to have a dampening effect on inflation expectations by firstly reducing the rate of depreciation in the exchange rate, and secondly, by restraining the expansion of money and credit and hence the ability of consumers to bid up prices."

The senator, in his various public appearances, has said that he considers tax reform and a review of the budgeting process as issues that have to be tackled for the Golding administration's growth policies to work.

business@gleanerjm.com