The socialist party has urged the Government to extend the deadline for small farmers to sign up for a new tax regime that may see many of traditional small farmers simply give up.
Socialist deputy Miguel Freitas today criticised the political machinations of Assunçao Cristas, Minister of Agriculture, in the fortnightly parliamentary debate.
"The Minister of Agriculture has deceived Portuguese farmers. After a year of repeated postponements of the new tax regime for small farmers she has repeatedly said she was working to simplify the system. Today the system is about to start and she has taken no action," said the Faro MP, on good form.
Miguel Freitas is right, last May Cristas said in parliament that she would present a set of measures intended to "simplify the scheme for small farmers trading below €10,000.”
"The Minister of Agriculture now says she will ask for special measures for small farmers, but what has the Lady Minister been doing for the past year? Why has she not asked that the tax system for small farmers to be postponed?" demanded Freitas who said it is essential "to extend the deadline for applications to the new tax regime" and urged the Government to make that decision today.
"If the Government does not extend the deadline, on Monday the Socialist Party will submit a draft request to parliament for it to extend the deadline," warned Freitas, keenly aware that the deadline was on February 1st and that many voters in Faro are involved in small scale agriculture.
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See also: http://www.algarvedailynews.com/news/369-algarve-s-small-famers-forced-to-give-up#comment-52
For the petition on Tomorrow Algarve, click here: http://www.tomorrowalgarve.com/community-news/community-news-section/tomorrow-news/525-traders-fear-for-future-of-lagos-marke
