The tax on tampons is set to be axed, but are the cabinet commodifying women further in order to swing the Brexit debate?
Following the Commons debate held in October 2015 after mass campaigning for the Conservative government to “stop taxing periods,” March 2016 saw the reach of an agreement from the 28 member states of the European Union to repeal the UK’s legislation on the taxation of female sanitary products. The original taxation of said “luxury” items was implemented in 1974 (under the then Labour government) as result of the UK joining the common marketplace (formed now as the European Union). The European Union holds the policy that sanitary products are liable for VAT due to their status as “non-essential” items, validating this on the basis that such products are environmentally unsustainable. However a gender debate across member states, with women within the UK in particular, has criticised this law as patriarchal, arguing it propagates a message that a woman’s feminity is there to be commodified and profited upon by the taxman and that women’s rights therefore are “non-essential”. Fundamentally, the law shows a lack of consideration as it does not acknowledge the necessity of these hygiene products as important for the basic health of all women. Labour MP Stella Creasy suggested that this rigid taxation “isn’t by accident, that’s by design of an unequal society, in which the concerns of women are not treated as equally as the concerns of men.” If implicated, the “luxury” products’ current VAT status set at 5% will be eradicated.
The decision to eradicate the VAT law responds to the consistent campaigning surrounding the debate. George Osborne assured the general public in November 2015 that their rights were being taken seriously, promising “I am going to use the 15 million pounds a year raised from tampon tax to fund women’s health and support charities.” Osborne’s efforts were not received well; his consideration still suggested that women should have to foot the bill for their own “issues,” further exemplifying the inequality within the debate.
(Image credit: Huffington Post)
In light of Osborne’s efforts, such a drastic political turn comes as a pleasant surprise, especially taking into account David Cameron’s statement that the eradication of the VAT would be “too difficult.” However it leads one to question, what has been the driving force behind the government’s recent vetting, especially regarding the Prime Minister’s recent dismissal. Osborne assures us that the government have “heard people’s anger over paying the tampon tax loud and clear,” however it comes at little coincidence that such reform has come amidst the crescendo of a Brexit debate, which is set to be resolved in the referendum later this year. The BBC reported in March that, “the long-running campaign to get tampons perorated is pulling in support from Tory MPs backing Brexit.” In consideration, the campaign’s pass alludes to wider political intentions about our position within Europe, rather than resolving the sociological issues of our country. The voices of protestors all over the UK called for a legitimised amendment within EU law. It is obviously an achievement for the UK to have finally axed the tax on products that are clearly essential to all women; however the political reasoning should not be centred upon the act of amending our legislation so that we go against the policies the European Union is built on. As it stands, the decision to eradicate VAT on sanitary products breaks the unanimous harmony of equal taxation the European Union holds as a political, economic board.
With UKIP previously promising in their 2015 manifesto to eradicate the tampon tax by withdrawing from the European Union, it is hard to not draw a distinction between UKIP’s political incentives, and the Conservative’s. Furthermore, the UK negotiating the framework of the European Union to benefit our own political system does not in turn create fair legislation for all women across Europe (France for instance taxing tampons at 20%). The UK’s vetting should be taken as initiative to modernise European law by which we can reform together in unison, not just in an economic sense but as a body of varying societies. It is not unreasonable to suggest that all women’s rights in Europe should be equal. In criticism, although the lift on the tampon tax should be celebrated as a positive move forward for UK legislation; the issue should be treated as an amendment to our human rights and not as a tool by Tory MPs to swing the Brexit opinion. Seemingly, the voices of many women haven’t necessarily been addressed amongst the shouting of “should we stay or should we go?” The principle remains that all women should be acknowledged as having the same rights as men and each other.
(Featured image credit: The Daily Beast)