SHIRE Hall is challenging the European Union's tax on tampons.

Gloucestershire County Council has voted to challenge the planned tax on female sanitary products.

Under European Union rules, female sanitary products are taxed at a 5 per cent VAT, as they are currently classified as a luxury item.

County councillors supported a motion proposed by Cllr Lesley Williams (Stonehouse, Lab), on December 2, and agreed that the tax should not be levied and they resolved to take action.

A motion was unanimously agreed for, Mark Hawthorne (Quedgeley, Con), leader of the council, to write to all MEPs in the South West and Gibraltar, Gloucestershire’s six MPs, and the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Rt Hon George Osborne MP, urging them to negotiate with European representatives to reduce the VAT charge to 0 per cent on all female sanitary products. 

The county council also requested the that the leader write to the European Commission, calling on them to change their policy and allow zero rating of female sanitary products.

 Cllr Lesley Williams, Leader of the Labour group, who proposed the motion, said: “For woman’s sanitary products to be classified as a luxury is an affront to the decent society that we claim to have.

"When Jaffa Cakes, cake decorations and crocodile meat are classified as essential – 0 per cent rated – products, but tampons are rated as a luxury – then I am sorry, but we seriously have our priorities messed up.”

Cllr Dorcas Binns, cabinet member for older people, (Nailsworth, Con), said: “It’s genuinely shocking that the European Commission argues the tampon tax is vital to stop ’distortions of competition in the internal market’.

"There was unanimous support for George Osborne’s position on this - now we all need to lobby the EU to get them to drop the European Tampon tax.

"It’s wholly wrong that unelected bureaucrats in Brussels are forcing women to pay tax on something absolutely vital."

 Cllr Jeremy Hilton (Kingsholm and Wotton, Lib) Liberal Democrat group leader, said: “We all know that the tax on female sanitary products is fundamentally wrong and needs changing.

"Until such time changes are made, I welcome the decision by the Chancellor of the Exchequer to use the income from this tax to support women’s charities.”