Gatchalian wants taxation to be 'as simple as buying goods’ online

Senator Sherwin Gatchalian on Wednesday said he intends to simplify taxation should he secure the chairmanship of the Senate ways and means committee in the 19th Congress.

“So in the next few years, if ever our plans will be realized and we will be chairing the ways and means committee, I want to put taxpayers first as a priority in the committee,” Gatchalian said in his speech at the Senate Tax Study and Research Office’s tax forum.

This means "taxing is as simple as buying goods in Shopee” or “as easy as booking a flight or booking a hotel," he added.

Gatchalian also said that he would make sure that there are mechanisms for reporting abusive government officials when it comes to tax collection.

“We also would like to focus on the small and thriving MSMEs (micro, small, and medium enterprises) sector. The MSMEs are the backbone of our economy because in terms of numbers, there are almost a million MSMEs in our country,” he said.

“So we focus on the taxpayers, we focus on MSMEs, we make sure that corruption and erring government officials are held to account. So broadly, these are the things we want to focus on, among many things,” he added.

Gatchalian said that he has no plans to change the tax reforms introduced by the Duterte administration.

“The other things are also to continue to simplify our tax regime. We have to give credit where credit is due. During the six-year administration of President Duterte, they have managed to really implement a lot of reforms in our tax regime. And those reforms are very important because they will set the tone in the next six years,” the senator said.

“I don't plan to touch any of those tax reforms. I don't plan to shoot or to change any of those reforms,” he said.

The 19th Congress will begin on July 25. —VBL, GMA News