Gail Alexan­der

The re­cent re­duc­tion in prop­er­ty tax, from three per cent to two per cent, will de­crease Gov­ern­ment rev­enue, with pro­jec­tions of $125 mil­lion for 2025, down from an an­tic­i­pat­ed $400 mil­lion for the pre­vi­ous fis­cal year of 2023/2024.

In 2025, the Gov­ern­ment ex­pects to col­lect $100.1 mil­lion from al­co­hol and to­bac­co tax­es and $63 mil­lion from on­line pur­chase tax­es, as out­lined in the 2025 Draft Es­ti­mates of Rev­enue pre­sent­ed along­side the $59.8 bil­lion bud­get for fis­cal 2024-25 by Fi­nance Min­is­ter Colm Im­bert. The to­tal pro­ject­ed rev­enue for 2025 stands at $54.3 bil­lion, which in­cludes $14.2 bil­lion from oil, $35.1 bil­lion from non-oil sources, and $4.1 bil­lion from cap­i­tal rev­enue. The 2024 bud­get, al­so val­ued at $59.3 bil­lion, es­ti­mat­ed rev­enue at $54.1 bil­lion but ex­pe­ri­enced a $3 bil­lion short­fall due to low­er en­er­gy prices.

Im­bert not­ed that by March 2024, Gov­ern­ment low­ered the prop­er­ty tax rate to ease the fi­nan­cial bur­den on prop­er­ty own­ers. By Sep­tem­ber 20th, some 89,441 res­i­den­tial prop­er­ty own­ers had paid $91 mil­lion in prop­er­ty tax­es, with at least 50 per cent of prop­er­ties ex­pect­ed to in­cur an­nu­al tax­es be­tween $432 and $1,080. The dead­line for pay­ment has been ex­tend­ed to No­vem­ber 29, and Gov­ern­ment plans to im­ple­ment an on­line pay­ment so­lu­tion by Oc­to­ber 31, 2024.

The DERE re­port re­vised prop­er­ty tax es­ti­mates to $150 mil­lion for 2024 and $125 mil­lion for 2025. In To­ba­go, the pro­ject­ed prop­er­ty tax is $3.5 mil­lion for 2024 and $3.8 mil­lion for 2025.

For 2024, re­vised earn­ings from al­co­hol and to­bac­co tax­es are es­ti­mat­ed at $101.8 mil­lion, slight­ly high­er than the 2025 pro­jec­tion, while on­line pur­chase tax for 2024 is re­vised to $62.2 mil­lion, just be­low the 2025 es­ti­mate. Cus­toms and Ex­cise du­ties on rum, beer, and cig­a­rettes are pro­ject­ed to gen­er­ate more rev­enue in 2025—$210 mil­lion, $230 mil­lion and $200 mil­lion re­spec­tive­ly—com­pared to 2024 fig­ures, which are $4 mil­lion to $5 mil­lion low­er. Li­cences and fees for liquor and mis­cel­la­neous items are al­so ex­pect­ed to rise slight­ly in 2025 to $10.3 mil­lion from $9.97 mil­lion.

The BIR an­tic­i­pates col­lect­ing $7.9 bil­lion in Val­ue Added Tax for 2025, low­er than the re­vised es­ti­mate of $9.4 bil­lion for 2024. Rev­enue from the sale of as­sets and oth­er cap­i­tal sources is pro­ject­ed to reach $4.1 bil­lion in 2025, dou­ble the 2024 re­vised es­ti­mate of $2.9 bil­lion. The re­port in­di­cates a to­tal of $16.1 bil­lion in do­mes­tic and for­eign bor­row­ing for 2024, with a pro­ject­ed $12.9 bil­lion for 2025, com­pris­ing $10.9 bil­lion in do­mes­tic bor­row­ing and $2.1 bil­lion in for­eign bor­row­ing.

$100M from traf­fic tick­ets

The re­port es­ti­mates $100 mil­lion in rev­enue from the Fixed Penal­ty Traf­fic Tick­et­ing Sys­tem in 2025, up from a re­vised $67.6 mil­lion for 2024. The TTPS is pro­ject­ed to earn $13.9 mil­lion from firearms and am­mu­ni­tion li­cens­ing fees in 2025, slight­ly down from $13.91 mil­lion in 2024, while pep­per spray per­mit fees are es­ti­mat­ed at $18,710 for 2024 and $16,500 for 2025.

In the elec­tion year 2025, the Elec­tions and Bound­aries Com­mis­sion ex­pects high­er rev­enue from elec­toral lists, maps, and re­ports, with re­vised es­ti­mates for 2024 at $11,000, $6,000, and $1,000 re­spec­tive­ly.

Gov­ern­ment prop­er­ty in­come is es­ti­mat­ed at $8.9 bil­lion for 2025, sur­pass­ing the 2024 es­ti­mate of $7.1 bil­lion, which in­cludes $13.1 mil­lion from rental in­come.

Roy­al­ties from oil, gas, as­phalt, and quar­ries are pro­ject­ed at $5.2 bil­lion, sig­nif­i­cant­ly high­er than the 2024 es­ti­mate of $2.3 bil­lion.