THE Department of Finance (DOF) on Tuesday expressed its support on higher alcohol excise tax as forwarded by Senate Ways and Means Committee Chairman Pilar Juliana S. Cayetano.
The DOF said Cayetano’s
proposal is “well-studied,” and called for the bill’s swift approval in the
Senate. Cayetano’s Senate Bill 1074 proposes a 10-percent increase in taxes for
alcohol
products starting 2023.
According to the solon, a significantly higher increase in the excise tax on alcohol products would be the “singular, reasonable and patriotic conclusion” of the extensive committee hearings conducted by the Senate tax panel after members “listened to various stakeholders, questioned and analyzed relevant information provided by resource persons and experts, in both the private and public sectors.”
Cayetano has blamed alcohol consumption for road accidents.
“Wonderful lives are cut short because of people who drink and drive. We often hear about innocent people dying from road crashes—someone who was once a father, a mother, a child, or a friend,” the lawmaker said. “In seconds, their lives are forever changed or wasted because a drunk person foolishly decided to take the wheel and drive.”
Cayetano added that “55 percent of the injured patients” treated in the PGH emergency room “have alcohol on their breath. [About] 25 percent of these injured patients are blood alcohol content positive.”
In the Philippines, there is a national law against drunk driving. Republic Act (RA) 10586 penalizes people who are caught driving under the influence of alcohol.
The Metropolitan Manila Development Authority has said last year that budgetary constraints impede the agency’s implementation of RA 10586 or the Anti-Drunk and Drugged Driving Act of 2013. The MMDA said has only more than 40 alcohol breath analyzers for the agency’s 2,000 personnel deployed in Edsa.
Cayetano also cited the adverse health impacts of alcoholism.
“Alcoholism is associated with at least 39 main diseases, including liver cirrhosis, cancer, pancreatic disease, hypertensive disease, tuberculosis, diabetes, and even behavioral and
psychotic disorders.
Finance Undersecretary Karl Kendrick T. Chua of the DOF’s Strategy, Economics and Results Group said they “will continue to extend the necessary technical assistance to help [Cayetano] preserve the rates in the Senate Ways and Means Committee’s well-studied committee report, as plenary deliberations resume, hopefully as soon as the Senate comes back in session.”
“We are one with the Senator in her push for significantly higher rates in alcohol excise taxes. Her analysis is correct that beyond the personal health costs, the socioeconomic costs of alcohol need to be mitigated,” Chua said. “The massive economic costs of alcohol abuse justify significantly higher rates. For behavior to change meaningfully, the tax rates have to be high enough.”
Preliminary estimates from the DOF indicate that alcohol may have an economic cost of as much as 1.7 percent of gross domestic product every year, equivalent to about a third of the country’s annual health expenditure.
SB 1074 was in the period of interpellation when the Congress took a break in October. The Senate and the House of Representatives will resume session on November 4.
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