Death and Taxes
Dear Pravin
Excuse the familiarity but, you are a public servant, I am a member of the public, in essence, I am one of the people you work for so I suspect I can afford to talk to you with the familiarity of my employee (if I could afford one after I have paid you guys). OK don’t shut off. Geez, can’t you take a joke? By the way, in case not enough people have told you, you did a great job at SARS and I have no doubt that you are doing an equally good job heading our Finance Department.
But telling you how great you are is not the point of this letter. While I was standing in the queue at SARS Carlton Centre to file yesterday for four hours, I started thinking about what I would like you to do with the money that I am giving you.
What gives me the power to do this? You ask. Uhhm, well, Prav, I realise, as I do every time I get my IRP5, that SARS takes 25% of my gross income. That’s about the same amount I spend on my child monthly, so I am thinking the nation has become my family member. Like my son, the nation is one of my dependants. And I should at least make suggestions on how I would like that money I am paying to be disbursed when you say your Budget Speech next year. We are not even close to your first Budget Speech yet but I am telling you way in advance so that you and your team will not say you didn’t have time to consider.
- Education – Prav, this is a must. Last year I was teaching English to first year tertiary students and I saw the absolute need for more money here. Although many of my students were from former Model C schools, few of them could conjugate a verb, let alone write a one page essay. If these are the students who have passed matric, I shudder to think what is happening with those who have not. Functional illiterates? And I am not just asking for more money so that my books can become part of the coursework (wink wink) but perhaps too for training for the teachers. What? They have sufficient qualifications? Perhaps that’s what SADTU tells you but I have a cousin who is a senior teacher at a government school and I almost cried when I read his reports. I could not understand anything the poor man had written and he was teaching History and Geography…using English as a medium. How scary is that?
- Health – Pravin, forget the cameras and the newsmen a la Tokyo. Just pop in anytime you want without warning at our nation’s largest hospital, Baragwanath and you will see what I mean. On a regular day in the emergency room, it takes at least the same amount of time it took me to file my taxes for a person to be attended to by a doctor (and that’s if they are lucky). The toilets in the wards are a breeding ground for all sorts of diseases because of their conditions. Then there are people sleeping on the floor because of insufficient beds. Your one certainty is that I shall do my taxes annually. The one certainty some of the sick have when they enter Bara is that they shall die while there. You will weep, your heart will break, and after a visit, you will want to take a lengthy shower to rid yourself of any germs you might have acquired while in the hospital. As if that is not bad enough, the staff is demoralised. So I am suggesting that you not only give Health Minister Aaron more money for equipment in hospitals, but to pay the doctors and nurses a living wage so that they do not run to private practice as soon as the opportunity arises.
And then there is one department I feel should get as little as possible of my money.
Prav, Department of Defence does NOT need any significant amount of money. We are not at war and we do not need any equipment worth R3 billion. Please.
And finally a no tax request.
I ask for zero taxation on one thing – no, not beer. Books, Prav, books. No more Value Added Tax on books. Books in South Africa are more expensive than anywhere else I have been – and this in a country that claims to want to create a reading culture. When your predecessor, he of the fine cufflinks Trey was asked to cancel this tax, he refused. His reason was that books are for the elite and therefore those who buy them can afford to (incidentally I could not buy his biography because I could not afford to). But should you maintain that? Should not book-buying become a populist thing in a nation that is lagging behind on basic reading skills? Readers are leaders Prav and I want to think that you are keen on creating a nation of leaders. Zero VAT on books, equals cheaper books and cheaper book equals more book sales (hopefully). With more book sales, perhaps writers will finally have royalties worth taxing and your successor at SARS will have more taxpayers and give you more money to disburse on service delivery for the next five years. A win-win situation for you and me.
I trust you will take all I have said into consideration between now and when you write your budget.
Sincerely,
A South African Taxpayer
