Caribbean Diplomats Fight UK’s APD

Caribbean diplomats in the United Kingdom are gearing up to lobby the British government for an ease in the airline passenger duty (APD), a tax which Caribbean countries say seriously affect their tourism industries.

Tourism and International Transport Minister Richard Sealy said the Caribbean diplomats have secured £40,000 to assist them in this effort. Sealy, who recently visited the United Kingdom to meet with stakeholders in the tourism industry, said the funds were sourced from a UK-based Jamaican Building Society to assist the High Commissioners in their fight.

He also said the APD Steering Group, of which Barbados’ High Commissioner was a member, was fully on board with the initiative. “High Commissioner (Hugh) Arthur is fully engaged along with the High Commissioners from the Co-operative Republic of Guyana, Jamaica, Trinidad, Antigua and Barbuda, Grenada, St Lucia, among others, who are definitely keen and reenergized to engage the British Government.

There will also be a £40,000 public campaign as part of the effort,” he added. The APD, instituted in 1994, is a British environmental tax aimed at offsetting aviation’s carbon footprint. In its initial stage, it was set at £5 (US$7.85) per person.

Regional governments have been lobbying London to remove the tax, which they said negatively affects the growth of the tourism industry since the Caribbean has been placed in a band that makes travel to the region much more expensive than travelling from London to the United States.

Last year, a number of leading international airlines including British Airways, EasyJet, Ryanair and Virgin Atlantic urged Osborne to suspend the planned APD pending the outcome of an independent study of the economic effects of such a tax rise.

The airlines said that the eight per cent increase introduced in April last year would reduce passenger numbers and hinder the UK’s economic recovery. They said that as a result of the increase, a family of four flying from the UK to the Caribbean would have to pay close to £400 in taxes. In 2005 such a family would have paid a total of £80 in taxes.