House body OKs bill exempting toll from VAT

Bayan Muna Representative Teodoro Casiño. INQUIRER FILE PHOTO

Without encountering much of an opposition, the House of Representatives ways and means committee on Tuesday approved several bills seeking to exempt toll roads from the value-added tax.

The committee approval was the first step in correcting the “anomalous tax” that the Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) wanted to impose on toll roads and showed that Congress was not deaf to the people’s cries, said Bayan Muna Representative Teodoro Casiño.

Batangas Representative Hermilando Mandanas, who chairs the committee, said he would ask President Benigno Aquino III to prioritize the bills, which will be consolidated into a single measure.

The Supreme Court earlier upheld the Aquino administration’s decision to impose the 12 percent VAT on toll fees, saying that the executive branch has the exclusive discretion on matters pertaining to the implementation of tax laws.

Casiño said the House committee’s approval of the bills should serve as a wake-up call for the President, who had pushed for the VAT to be imposed on toll fees.

The Aquino government was counting on an additional P2 billion a year in revenues from the VAT on toll fees.

Casiño said Mr. Aquino should direct the BIR to stop collecting the VAT on toll fees.

“As it is, the toll fees are already exorbitant and adding VAT would be a double whammy on the people. President Aquino should be sensitive to the suffering of the people due to poverty and the series of calamities befalling them,” he said in a statement.

He said he would urge his House colleagues to pass the bill on third and final reading before Congress goes on recess.

In the meantime, the people should continue to make their opposition to the VAT on toll fees.

Motorists and transport groups have been protesting the recent imposition of the VAT on toll, warning that it could lead to an increase in the prices of basic commodities. Leila Salaverria