(Trinidad Guardian) After five months of hard battle between the Government and Opposition, legislation to facilitate the Foreign Account Taxation Agreement (FATCA) between T&T and the United States was passed in the House of Representatives at 7.48 on Wednesday night, with unanimous support from both sides.
“I finally beg to move, after many months – five months,” Finance Minister Colm Imbert said with a laugh of relief, as debate and final committee examinations of the legislation concluded.
Legislation was passed with amendments in several areas with the nod of approval from all 39 Government and Opposition MPs present.
At least three Opposition votes had been required for passage.
The legislation enables local financial institutions to report to the US Internal Revenue Service (IRS) on accounts held by US clients. This will be done via T&T’s Board of Inland Revenue. The FATCA facility is part of US’ tax evasion law.
The legislation came to fruition on Wednesday night in the Lower House, almost at the eleventh hour of the deadline for approval which the US had recommended. The US had suggested passage this month – which ends next week with Carnival.
Having crossed the first hurdle in the Lower House, the legislation must now be debated in the Upper House. This will be after Carnival, Attorney General Faris Al-Rawi said after Wednesday night’s debate.
“It’s a foregone conclusion, we’ll get the Opposition’s support in the senate and therefore achieve the three fifth’s majority vote there,” the AG said.
“However, we’re very open-minded regarding the views on the Independent bench, since only two Independent senators had been on the Joint Select Committee whose report the House accepted (on Tuesday).”
Al-Rawi said the vast majority of amendments made to the bill were done by the Government “in the absence of the Opposition from debates during December last.”
The main amendment done Wednesday night concerned agreement that banks would notify an account holder that their sensitive information had been passed to the BIR and the US IRS.
The Opposition had suggested the account holder be notified 28 days before the information was sent to the BIR and IRS.
But Imbert said the Treasury Solicitor and Law Association had said this would be contrary to the aim of the legislation.
Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley also said Government couldn’t have agreed to that, since it would undermine the legislation and create costs for the taxpayer in the event the account holder chose to challenge it legally during the 28-day period.
“We’re not going to agree to that – it has consequences for the taxpayers,” the PM added.
However, all sides eventually agreed the account information would be reported to the relevant authorities by September 30 of the year in question and the account holder would be notified – with one notice – four months later in the following January.
“The Opposition presented significant amendments and in the end, Government gave us a version of what we sought – notification to the account holder. The Government did well to be flexible,” said UNC MP Dr Bhoe Tewarie of the collaboration at session’s end.
PM: Trump called of his free will
T&T is making world news today for the wrong reasons, and not because of its students or Olympic gold medals, Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley says.
Rowley said T&T therefore needed a lobbyist in the right places to speak for T&T and convey the correct picture and open doors to let people know who T&T is, before the country is harmed. “Therefore, when T&T hires any lobbyist, whether for $1m or half million, it is to protect T&T and ensure the correct information is transmitted,” he indicated.
Rowley, however, denied any lobbyist was paid “$1m” to obtain the conversation with US President Donald Trump last Sunday. He said he was at home when someone said the US President had called. He added it didn’t cost T&T “a cent since the US President understands T&T is a country the US holds very dearly for good reasons – the US is our major trading partner and we’re a leader in Caricom.”
Rowley also stressed T&T hadn’t paid for any lobbyist to go to the US to deal with banking de-risking issues. He said Caricom had agreed its Secretariat would fund a lobbyist regarding this, since some banks were taking action against some Caribbean states. He said Caricom had urged all states to be compliant so the region would be seen as this. He said he’d been invited to go to Chile since the Chilean President had indicated Chile would assist Caricom on that.
