By Aaron Humes: Leader of the Opposition Tracy Taegar-Panton accused the Government of underbudgeting and overpromising, having to come back to the House of Representatives for $210 million in supplementary appropriations despite initially boasting of high economic growth and promising to “get it right” in the delayed May national Budget.
“Taxpayers, working families and communities continue to shoulder the burden of an Administration that governs with no regard for transparency, no regard for accountability, and no regard for the economic hardships of our people,” she said, questioning whether revenue is keeping up with expenditure. The truth of the matter, she went on to claim, is that fees and levies have increased if not taxes, and the Government has not reduced fuel prices even with crude oil prices down worldwide.
Belizeans care about the high cost of living, and so $210 million is not ‘pocket change’ or ‘incidental spending’ but a “massive overrun, a giant fiscal wake-up and a glaring indictment on a Government that has lost control of its spending. A Government that lost control of its priorities. And a Government…that has lost control and lost the confidence of the Belizean people, it is a matter of fact,” Taegar-Panton argued.
Mesopotamia area representative Lee Mark Chang repeated his earlier warning that many Ministries had underreported their expenditure to make the Budget appear balanced – and still came up $40 million short. That Budget was never ‘realistic’ and ‘honest’ when it should have been, and this supplementary confirms it, he said.
Government Ministers Henry Charles Usher and Francis Fonseca, among others, counter-attacked, with Usher asking whether the Opposition would not support the ‘unforeseen expense’ of pay increases negotiated with the Joint Unions – what he called ‘investing in public officers.’ Additionally, the Government is paying higher transfer grants per the Collective Bargaining Agreement with the unions signed last year.
Fonseca reminded that the previous Government spent up to $1.5 billion in supplementary allocations with no accountability, ignoring their responsibility to present same to the National Assembly.
Prime Minister John Briceño quipped that he almost misses former parliamentarian Moses ‘Shyne’ Barrow because he seemed more prepared than the current UDP crew. But he maintained that the expenses being debated are unforeseen and not entirely expected, and accused the Opposition of calling for support for certain sectors, then hypocritically complaining about spending in the House. The UDP brought six such appropriations in the months before the 2020 election, including one for $198 million. He also pointed out that the 2024-2025 appropriation is already accounted for and its debate is in line with the Finance and Audit (Reform) Act.
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By Aaron Humes: Leader of the Opposition Tracy Taegar-Panton accused the Government of underbudgeting and overpromising, having to come back to the House of Representatives for $210 million in supplementary appropriations despite initially boasting of high economic growth and promising to “get it right” in the delayed May national Budget. “Taxpayers, working families and communities
The post “Government has lost control,” says Leader of the Opposition, but Government Ministers defend allocations appeared first on Belize News and Opinion on www.breakingbelizenews.com.