We have sought clarification from the Department of Finance on their intention to reduce newspapers both national and local to the zero VAT category but continue to apply the existing rate of 9% to magazines.
We do not accept that children’s comics, educational magazines and current affairs periodicals should be viewed as being any less worthy of having a very valuable societal content when compared to newspapers.
It is much more desirable that people reading published magazines obtain their information from a trusted source rather than from anonymous social media sites. We would have to suggest that news and magazines should be treated the same for VAT purposes.