Senator: Budget is caring, not progressive

Independent Senator Christopher Thomas has awarded the Budget four marks out of a possible six, on a list of criteria developed by economist, the late Frank Rampersad.

Speaking on the Budget in the Senate on Thursday, Thomas said the Budget showed a good balance of trade ($2.9 billion), “very impressive” steps against poverty,  good measures to tackle employment, and was “caring.” In contrast, he said, the public debt relative to GDP was too high (51.8 percent) and the Budget fell short as an instrument of economic transformation. “The Government should say how it intends to manage this debt, especially as the Government is seeking to raise another $3 billion this fiscal year. The explanation of ‘re-financing’ is not good as this just extends the time to pay. The public debt should normally be 25 to 30 percent.”   

While satisfied with the Budget’s provisions for employment, he noted the sum of the URP and CEPEP allocations was a half-billion dollars, and he agreed with Senator Dr Eastlyn McKenzie that such job creation should be more structured and focussed and have “transitioning possibilities.” The Budget fell short in creating economic transformation, Thomas explaining: “I see the Budget more as a ‘caring’ than an ‘innovative’ Budget. It is ‘enlightened’ but not necessarily a ‘progressive’ Budget.” Of Trinidad and Tobago’s bid to be FTTA headquarters, Thomas said influential foreigners had asked him about the state of crime in the country. He said: “I have been consistently asked an embarrassing question. Is Trinidad and Tobago ready for the FTTA in relation to what we hear?” 

Lamenting pervasive and destructive elements, he urged: “We must take hold of it. I would plead with the Opposition to collaborate in this area.” He took issue with Prime Minister Patrick Manning’s former statement that the average citizen had nothing to fear from crime, which Thomas said, suggested that we knew the areas where crimes occur and that we needed to focus on those areas. He said law enforcement should now not be a question of numbers of police officers but of intelligence-information, technology and data. Returning to the FTTA theme, Thomas asked if we had a national plan to be ready for the FTTA advent in 2005, whether or not Trinidad and Tobago became FTTA headquarters. Recalling an incident where a public official had to spell out the name of Uruguay to a subordinate, Thomas urged: “We need to be a little more open, developed and clear, in terms of our neighbours, a market of 800 million people which is coming on stream.” Pondering on whether we were bilingual, Thomas asked: “Do we have facilities for international conferences? I don’t see that in the Budget. Can we handle the volume of trade expected from 2005?”