By David Morris MP
A few of my constituents have contacted me over the weekend to ask why I voted against the amendment to the finance bill last Monday which called for a removal of VAT on Sanitary products. I wanted to write a blog article on my site to explain my decision as there seems to be a lot of misinformation regarding the vote.
Firstly I do not support a VAT on sanitary products, I do not see these as a luxury item and if it was in the Governments gist to stop this tax then I would support it.
I even asked a question on this in the 12th February 2015 in last Parliament.
To ask Mr Chancellor of the Exchequer, whether his Department has made an assessment of the potential merits of removing VAT on womens sanitary products.
The response I received was from Andrea Leadsom who was then the Exchequer Secretary to the Treasury and she said:
The UK applies a 5% reduced rate of VAT, the lowest permissible under EU law, to the supply of sanitary products.
Under European Law EU member states cannot remove the VAT levy on sanitary products, they are only able to apply the lowest rate which is currently 5%.
EU states have surrendered their own rights to set VAT rates below 5% because in a free market people would cross the border in order to buy cheaper products. Had the vote to zero rate the VAT gone through, no action would have been taken as the UK would have needed the approval of the European Commission. If the UK changed the VAT Levy without the correct consent it would have been reprimanded in the EU Law courts and ultimately fined for being unlawful.
The UK Government would like to see the VAT on sanitary products lifted and this is why they have announced that this will be added to their list of renegotiations as part of the UK’s renegotiations on their membership of the EU.
I support the Government on this issue and would like to see the VAT repealed but I would like to do this in a lawful way and chose not to vote on motions which are unlawful, or even worse cannot achieve what they intend to do such as the amendment last week.