Sorry...not July....i meant April just a few weeks ago. Typo.

Bogart but you can see the increase in the number of little import businesses over the past 3 years. In cases where the price gouging is too much then people just use Amazon.

The Bahamian people need to get serious and fight against our invasion the same way Hungary is doing. They just re-elected President Orban in July and every bahamian would do will to watch and read this awesome speech he recently gave in Pohland. Dr. Minnis would do well to emulate him.

Watch. It is worth your time. 13 minutes.

https://youtu.be/EbINrdyAXlE

Bogart - reduced duties at same time as increased VAT.

VAT is a MUCH more efficient and accountable tax. Duties are just "i ain't got nothin to declare".

TalRussell - i cant believe im agreeing with you but yes you are correct this new govt has yet to tell us where the VAT money has gone under their watch, not to mention as you say number house money.

I heard KP say about 2 months ago that it is in the consolidated fund. That is the same foolishness we heard from Halkitis. We want it segregated and assigned to certain categories like a special fund.

As i keep saying ... cut duties a lot and increase VAT to 10%.

Proudloud - exactly correct. Duties should be cut dramatically and even cut gas & diesel tax a little bit - but raise VAT to 10%. Use a little bit of the extra VAT to subsidize BPL a little to bring down bills for those whose bills range between 150 and 300 per month. In other words, a middle class tax cut.

Dont remove VAT from breadbasket. The more you subsidize the poor, the more poor you have to subsidize. Every time a poor woman is able to save $500 under her mattress, she stops taking her pills.

"Instead of tearing down, bulldozing, eradicating, why not build up develop? Why not give hope and create opportunity?"

Yes you silly lady. That's exactly the same question Bahamians have been asking about Haitians for 40 years. Why do you guys prefer to make a dozen babies instead of making good homes to live in? Why do you force "hundreds" of children to live in shanty towns? Do Haitians not love their children?

Are you in the process of overbreeding and thereby "ethnically cleansing" Bahamians out of their own country? Just a casual glance by a neutral observer would draw that conclusion.

Aegeaon ... if you want to learn about "hatred" get a dozen Bahamians together with some tents and you all go down to Haiti and setup a little food cart or something and try to live there.

Please video it and post it on facebook for me. Be sure to quickly press "post" at least 3 seconds before your last arm is cut off.

Emac - i agree 100% with each point you've made.

I'm disappointed that so far all we've heard about the Bill is with regard to the budget. We need monthly totals on ACTUAL spending and ACTUAL income broken down by department/category along with real information about our DEBT showing the 8 billion broken down by who we borrowed it from, for what purpose, when, at what interest rate, each payment date and amount along with running balances.

Should we get this info? No we are just children and the government is our parents. They would say we are not "financially savvy enough" to understand the "big picture" anyway.

Aegeaon...interesting how you and i are 100% opposite on every issue. A coffee at Starbucks would prove interesting i'm sure :-)