The South African Institute of Taxation says government should focus on expanding the tax base rather than imposing huge new tax increases.

The institute’s CEO, Professor Keith Engel, says better enforcement and job creation are critical to increasing revenue.

He says the South African Revenue Service (SARS) is also targeting undisclosed wealth and using digitalisation and third-party information to strengthen tax collection.

Engel was speaking ahead of the institute’s annual Tax Indaba, which will take place from the 14th to the 16th of September in Sandton, Johannesburg.

“But the real issue has been, for quite some time, and you see in newspapers, that we need to expand the tax base. And the only way to expand the tax base is not through law, but through better enforcement. Now, that’s a little outside the scope of the revenue service. This revenue service is about collecting. But yes, I think really the big issue is: how do we get this economy going again? And that really is a bigger political issue. And how do we use government to actually produce jobs? And unfortunately, government is stuck in spending more on jobs, more regulation and more on other kinds of things like that and more on political grandstanding.”

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