§ 53. Lieut.-Colonel Sir Thomas Mooreasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether he is aware that, under Notice No. 78N, issued by the Commissioner of Customs and Excise, elaborate rules have been laid down as to the manner in which medicines and drugs must be packed if the contents are to be free of Purchase Tax, and as under these rules a person buying 100 aspirin tablets sold under a brand name is obliged to pay the full rate of tax, but a bottle of 150 of the same tablets obtained by means of a prescription from a medical practitioner is free of tax, if he will revise these rules.
§ Mr. JayThe exemption from Purchase Tax explained in Notice 78N meets the request made during discussion on the last Finance Bill that certain proprietary drugs should be freed from Purchase Tax when supplied on a doctor's prescription. The exemption was granted by the Purchase Tax (No. 1) Order, 1949 (S.I. 1949, No. 46) which has been before the House.
§ Sir T. MooreWhy this senseless discrimination in regard to the purchase of the same drug by different methods?
§ Mr. JayThe hon. and gallant Member calls it "senseless discrimination," but this House decided that it should work that way and the suggestion actually came from the hon. and gallant Member's side of the House.
§ Mr. StanleyIs not the Economic Secretary fully aware that from this side of the House we protested against the whole system of the tax being levied on these medical articles merely because they were proprietary; and that we asked that the tax should depend entirely upon whether in fact they were essential and useful for health purposes?
§ Mr. JayThis is a provision by which certain proprietary articles are exempted; therefore, it goes in the direction which the right hon. Gentleman was advocating.
§ Mr. StanleyWould it not now be better to go the whole way in that direction?
§ Dr. SegalIf these medicines are bought under prescription from a general medical practitioner, ought not the brand name to be obliterated?