Young couples will find it more costly to raise a child with the implementation of the Goods and Services Tax (GST), flayed a female MP today.

DAP’s Teo Nie Ching, who delivered her second child recently, criticised the government for not regulating the prices of essential goods needed to raise a child like milk powder and baby diapers according to the Domestic Trade, Cooperatives and Consumerism Ministry’s consumer price guideline.

“Malaysia has a lot of young couples and it will be expensive to raise a kid. With GST, it is too costly to have babies. Cost is a big concern for parents,” she said at a press conference at the Parliament lobby today.

Teo ( left ) concluded the increase in prices of items are due to improper regulation of prices according to the consumer guideline book released by the ministry before GST was implemented.

“Even though formula milk is supposed to be zero rated but all prices across supermarkets have gone up.

“According to the guideline book, a lot of things should be cheaper but the biggest problem is that the guideline is not useful at all,” she added.

Based on her findings, Teo said despite the government’s guideline stating that prices for goods like milk powder should reduce by two percent at least, the prices in several supermarkets have increased by seven to fifteen percent.

Young couples dissuaded to have children

The Kulai MP added that due to the rising costs, many young couples would be dissuaded to have children including herself who had contemplations in raising another child.

“Even for my husband and I, we have had this discussion. It is expensive to raise a kid as you have expenses for education, childcare and medical fees which is a burden to the people especially young couples.

“Younger couples will be dissuaded from having children because they have to focus on other things like buying a house, car and dealing with the daily cost of living,” she explained.

Teo also called on the government to ensure the guideline book is properly adhered as well as subsidies given to young couples like that done by the Penang and Selangor state governments.

“I urge the government to explain to us on the use of the book but in reality the prices don’t seem to be going down. They ask us to be smart shoppers but how to be smart shoppers when nothing is according to the book?,” she queried.