The NLA's argument was that the extra 60-70 billion baht generated annually would be allocated to education and health care. Thankfully, sane thinking prevailed and the Finance Ministry came out the following day to say that raising VAT was not the paramount issue as the economy was just starting to recover, a notion that I totally second. Thailand's gross domestic product saw surprising 3.3% growth in the first quarter, higher than most economists and analysts had anticipated. The better numbers were due to rising exports and an increase in domestic consumption, not to mention a rise in services revenue. But the NLA thought it was the right time to look at raising VAT as soon as possible.

Source: Bangkok Post May 20, 2017 21:11 UTC