Property tax hike not cause of rising living costs in Selangor, rep says

KUALA LUMPUR, Dec 27 — The Selangor government today denied claims that a hike in property taxes contributed to the rise in the cost of living for people living in the state.

The state government said the rise in household expenses was caused by cuts in subsidies, the ringgit’s depreciation and the implementation of the Goods and Services Tax (GST) by the federal government.

Yin Shao Loong, strategic communications director from the Selangor Mentri Besar’s Office said that the highest number in household spending was recorded in Kuala Lumpur and Putrajaya, which are governed by Barisan Nasional.

He said this was based on findings by the Statistics Department in the Household Income and Expenditure Survey Report 2016.

“Was this caused by taxes and costs related to property, housing and business premises in the Federal Territories?

“It is expected that the cost of living will increase exponentially next year, following the government’s move to have employers to pay foreign workers’ levy, effective this coming 1 January. Surely employer will have to shift the levy cost to the consumer, which will burn bigger holes in the people’s pockets,” Yin said in a statement.

He was responding to former Economic Planning Unit in the Prime Minister’s Department officer Isham Jalil, who claimed yesterday that the move by the Selangor government to raise property-related taxes and other costs had given pressure to business sector, which has in turn impacted consumers.

The political economist said the Selangor government’s revenue had increased after it raised property-related taxes since the federal opposition won the state in Election 2008.

Yin responded to this by pointing out that the Peduli Rakyat (People Care) programme reflected the state government’s attentiveness and efforts to tackle the economic burden of the people of Selangor.

He said through the initiative, the state government had imposed tax exemption to 790,443 village homes and low-cost houses in Selangor (RM113 million), exempted business license fee towards 162,010 businesses (RM19.3 million) since 2016, and a nominal fee of only RM1,000  for residential land owners, benefitting 5,317 settlers of state owned-land who cannot afford to pay the premium.

He said the Selangor Land Rules 2003 had not been amended since 14 years ago as the state government remained committed in the current land tax tariff for all types of real estates in the state.