Cozier made the comment in support of the bill, entitled the Nevis Property Tax Ordinance 2007, during a sitting of the Nevis Island Assembly on April 15th.

He called on the people of Nevis to recognise their obligation to pay taxes, and emphasized that the approach was important.

"The tax itself has to be as fairly imposed as possible. There was a review board and an appeal court process provided for those who felt that they were unfairly tax as outlined by section 72 (1) page 30 of the legislation," he explained.

The first major property tax legislation in Nevis was passed in the Assembly late on 15th April, after Premier of Nevis and Minister of Finance in the Nevis Administration, Joseph Parry, sought leave to have the Nevis Property Tax Ordinance 2008 read a second and third time.

The historic Ordinance will modernise the valuation property taxes of Nevis through the introduction of market value as the validation standard for most properties on the island.

It was tabled and received its first reading at a sitting of the Assembly in November, 2007.

During his presentation, Parry pointed to the need for the legislation, and argued that it was one of several ways in which the Administration would be able to increase its revenue generation. The increased revenue, he explained, would be used to provide the public with important services such as health care, education, crime prevention measures and fire services.

Parry further revealed that while the property taxation legislation was being prepared, there were a number of arguments brought forward with regard to who should and should not pay the tax.

"We [Administration] looked at an approach whereby there would be a band, an evaluation of a band and a particular rate and as we moved upward the rate would be increased or decreased. The question is do you want to encourage people to have larger homes? Are you going to decrease or increase the tax as the home becomes more expensive? ... If you increase the tax you are sending the message to homeowners that in Nevis we don't want large homes. If we decrease the tax we are saying yes we need to encourage larger homes," he stated.

"We looked at that what happened in St. Kitts and the Organisation of East Caribbean states [OECS] and we made a decision to look at the matter and we decided to have one rate and the difference will be made according to the evaluation and according to the market value of the home," he added.

The Finance Minister explained that it was agreed that property owners - foreign or local - would pay the tax, unless they fell into the exempt category. Nonetheless, he explained that consideration would be given to individuals, dependant on their economic circumstances.

Under the Nevis Property Tax Ordinance 2008, any properties of the government; and properties of a statutory body other than a prescribed statutory body will be exempted.

So too will property owned or leased by or held in trust for a religious body on which is located a building used exclusively for religious worship. Exemption will also be given to properties licenced as private burial grounds.

Property to the extent that it is owed or leased and used for charitable, benevolent, philanthropic, private educational and diplomatic purposes is also exempt.

Parry referred to the 1913 property tax legislation previously in place as erratic and unfair, which led to advantages and disadvantages.

This act, he explained, dealt with rental value based on an assessment of rental for a period of one year, then a rate was applied to it and that was how people were charged. But the rental value method was a practice long discarded by other Caribbean islands and the world over who had already shifted to property valuation.

According to Mr. Parry, the regime which Nevis will move to under the new legislation would utilize three methods. He explained:

"The first one is very common and what realtors use. You go into an area and you find out what people are willing to pay for a property and then you make comparisons and then you establish a value from that.

"The second method is the cost approach [which] basically depends on how much a person pays for the construction of a property. The range for square feet for construction is 100 from about 20 dollars per square foot up to a high of about 290 dollars."

"The third method is the income approach which is used for skyscrapers and large buildings. The income over a year is capitalized and a market value is worked out from that."