SENIOR OFFICIALS of the finance ministry spent a big portion of yesterday trying to clear the cobwebs that left the country unsure about the new items which will attract the 16.5 per cent general-consumption tax (GCT), originally slated to take effect tomorrow.

However, The Sunday Gleaner learnt that the list of items will, instead, be sent to Cabinet on Monday to be signed off.

More than 48 hours after Finance Minister Audley Shaw announced that the Government intended to pull in $7.5 billion this fiscal year by reducing the number of items listed as exempt, it was obvious that the devil remained in the details.

On Friday, Shaw was unable to provide the detail, informing journalists at a post-Budget media briefing that a full list would be published at the end of the day.

When that deadline was missed, Government sources told The Sunday Gleaner that the list would be released early Saturday.

But up to late afternoon, the list had not been released and efforts to contact Shaw had not been unsuccessful. Other government officials seemed just as confused as they sought to avoid official comment.

"There will be no tax on computers for educational use, but other computers will be taxed," one government official told The Sunday Gleaner, while unable to say who would distinguish between computers being bought for educational use and those bought to play games and send emails.

The Government official also struggled as he attempted to explain the finance ministry's claim that printed matter, not including newspapers, would now attract GCT.

"Textbooks will not be taxed, I can promise you that," the official said.

But he could not say if books, such as Barack Obama's Audacity of Hope, would attract GCT.