Opposition Leader and Shadow Finance Minister Grant Gibbons has called on Government to release a tax review that was completed during the United Bermuda Party's final months in Government in 1998.

Speaking with The Royal Gazette last week, Dr. Gibbons said: "One of the issues which I think we have raised repeatedly is the tax review which the UBP Government commissioned, and which the PLP Government - particularly (Finance Minister) Mr. (Eugene) Cox - asked for additional work on, should be released as I feel it would be very useful in forming the foundation for the discussion about how Government raises revenue, particularly as our economy is changing."

Dr. Gibbons said it was clear that international business had grown extensively in the 1990s and the early part of this century while tourism had declined during the last ten years.

He highlighted the changing nature of the economy such as the increase in other sources of Government revenue like investment income from abroad, and said Government needed to discuss how revenue is raised in future.

He said: "Indeed I think we need to flush out any lingering issues that were raised in the House a month or so ago, where a number of Government backbenchers, Mr. (Delaey) Robinson particulary, espoused the virtues of income tax. I think the community deserves a broader explanation as to whether this is something that is simply waiting in the wings because it was raised with a great deal of enthusiasm by a number of members on the Government side.

"The point is Mr. Cox should release this report as it will provide the basis for further discussion about how Government raises revenue."

Dr. Gibbons said the report was completed in the summer of 1998 and despite Mr. Cox promising in a Budget statement to release the report, he asked the consultants to go back and do some further work on it.

And Dr. Gibbons said: "So at this point, that takes you into 1999/2000, presumably we are talking about something which is a year or two old. But nevertheless, I think it would be a good starting point for any discussion about the economy."

Several opposition MPs have called on Government to release the report, including Dr. Gibbons on several occasions.

During a sitting of the House of Assembly in March last year, Dr. Gibbons rose to a challenge made a week previously by Mr. Cox concerning the release of the review.

Dr. Gibbons had made a call for Mr. Cox to release the review as he had promised, to which Mr. Cox said he had never made such a promise and asked Dr. Gibbons to show him where he had done so.

When the House met a week later on March 2, Dr. Gibbons read to Mr. Cox his statement from Government's first Budget speech in 1999 in which Mr. Cox said: "Mr. Speaker, in the election platform, the Government pledged to conduct a review of taxation in Bermuda before deciding whether to make any changes in the structure... I have met with the consultant who began the review of Bermuda's taxes and asked him to perform additional work in his study area to assist me in my review. In due course his recommendations will be made public together with Government's response. The Government will fulfil its commitment to a tax review but the time available since the election has not been sufficient to complete such an exercise as at this date."

Dr. Gibbons then said the report had languished for almost two years without being made public even though it had cost more than $100,000.

Mr. Cox could not deny making the statement and responded: "I thank the former Minister for bringing this forward, and the operative words are, `in due course'."

The review was started in 1997 by Harry Gutman of US law firm King and Spalding and economist Eric Toder formerly with the US Treasury Department.

The review examined Government's reliance on current consumption taxes, the distribution of taxes in the various sectors of the economy, the appropriateness of Customs Duty as the main form of indirect income tax and the appropriateness of tax privileges.

Copies of the review were circulated to a limited number of private sector representatives for initial feedback before releasing it for public discussion.

The PLP came in for strong criticism after increasing Land Tax in July, 1999 which raised an extra $7 million for Government coffers, and before the House adjourned for the Christmas break, backbenchers such as Mr. Robinson, and in the past Hamilton West MP Arthur Hodgson, have called for income tax.

Mr. Cox could not be reached for comment yesterday.