MAYOR OF Kingston Angela Brown Burke is pointing to local-owned businesses as some of the main culprits identified by the Trade Licence Compliance 2012 Initiative.

The mayor, speaking at Tuesday's Kingston and St Andrew Cor-poration council meeting, said she would be sending out letters to various organisations, including the Jamaica Chamber of Commerce, to make their members aware of what is required of them.

"The reports coming in from the individuals who are on the road are that there are areas where we probably would have expected that non-Jamaicans would have been the harder group to deal with and that has not been so. Our own local companies are the ones that give us the greatest challenge," Brown Burke said, noting that investigators had found a number of irregularities on their travels.

"We have found individuals who are both wholesalers and retailers and who believe that paying the wholesale fee of $1,000 is sufficient. We have found individuals who are operating who are not even registered with the Companies Office of Jamaica. This is not acceptable."

Seeing results

However, she said that since the initiative, revenues at the Tax Administration of Jamaica have increased to J$1.5 million. She also said that at July 2012, the revenue was estimated just over $260,000.

"So, it means that we are making progress," she concluded.

The mayor also promised there would be enquiries on those businesses who had promised compliance.

"We are talking nicely and we are seeking cooperation. If these efforts don't result in all our companies complying, then we will move on and we will bring the full brunt of the law."

She also said the KSAC was not averse to calling out companies to the public. This would inform customers "that by shopping in non-compliant stores and companies, they are also helping to undermine our financial ability to do as much as we can".