Kan Mulls Lower Tax on Daily Necessities, Refunds

Tokyo, June 21 (Jiji Press)--Japan needs to consider measures to
ease burdens on low-income people if it raises the consumption tax, Prime
Minister Naoto Kan said.
A lower tax rate on daily necessities and tax refunds are essential
in discussing a consumption tax hike, Kan said in a street speech in
Yokohama, south of Tokyo, on Sunday.
Kan's Democratic Party of Japan has called for suprapartisan talks
on raising the 5 pct tax in its campaign agenda for the July 11 election.
The prime minister questioned the advisability of the country's
rising social security costs being financed by government debt, instead of
higher taxes.
In a separate speech in Tamura, Fukushima Prefecture, north of
Tokyo, DPJ policy chief Koichiro Genba proposed refunding taxes paid on
daily necessities on an annual basis.
Genba said that enhancing social security cannot be fully financed
by cost cuts and a revenue increase on economic growth.
The party would ask the public to accept a consumption tax hike
after intensively implementing anti-deflation measures and wasteful spending
cuts for two or three years, Genba said.