Media News - Tuesday, April 29, 2008

Hungarian culture fund chief defends proposed Internet tax against ‘false’ arguments

Critics of the new taxes on Internet-related services the Hungarian government plans to implement are basing their opposition on ‘false’ reasoning, the head of the country's National Cultural Fund (NKA) said last week. According to privatbankar.hu, NKA head László Harsányi said that the .8 percent ‘cultural contribution’ being proposed for a variety of online services would help encourage, rather than stunt, the cause of developing a modern information society in Hungary. Harsányi said that the charges would amount to only an extra HUF 20 - HUF 70 (EUR 0.07c - 0.28) per Hungarian Internet user per month, and that this revenue would be spent on projects aimed at ‘closing the digital gap’ that sees Hungary lagging behind some regional peers in Internet penetration and usage. The new tax would target ISPs, data transfer and work by some designers, and would produce an estimated HUF 2.5bn - HUF 3bn (roughly EUR 10m - EUR 12m) a year in revenue for the NKA. The proposal to tax online services comes as the government plans to slap a cultural levy on clothing retailers, based on the concept that clothing design is a form of culture. Meanwhile, Harsányi said the arguments against the ‘Internet tax’ were effectively moot, as the country's Culture Minister has no plans to withdraw the proposition, and there is as yet no sign of this happening. (Realdeal.hu)

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