Bharath: Budget should address food, shelter, water and security
- Peter S
- Jul 19, 2024
- 3 min read
Updated: Aug 5, 2024
The country is fed up with a long list of broken promises and daily deterioration in the quality of people’s lives, so Monday’s Budget must tangibly address the key issues of security, food, water, shelter, job creation and job security, former People’s Partnership Minister Vasant Bharath said yesterday.
There must be specific attention to new T&T Police Service (TTPS) initiatives on crime which is all pervasive, he added as he gave his projections for the 2023-2024 Budget which will be presented in Parliament on Monday by Finance Minister Colm Imbert.
“The Finance Ministry continues to view the annual budget as a bookkeeping exercise, balancing debits and credits. In today’s world, it is not. The budget, in modern-day thinking, is meant to reallocate resources based on social and economic priorities, ensuring stability and preparing for growth and prosperity,” Bharath said.
“No budget in the last eight years has accomplished that! One only has to look at the dismal growth rates over that period to establish the Government’s failed economic policies - increased taxation, borrowing, sale of state assets and extracting from the Heritage and Stabilisation Fund.
The net result is a fall in real GDP of 20 per cent since 2015, a rise in food prices of over 30 per cent, forex shortages, declining production of both oil and gas, higher gas prices, capital flight, murderous crime, woeful health care, dilapidated infrastructure and a failed education system.”
He added: “I suspect the Finance Minister will beat his chest about the recent Dragon Gas deal but quite frankly, until a contract is signed with a term sheet, a cooperation agreement is of no value.
“As a country, we’re at the bottom of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs - food, shelter, water and security - a society in the wilderness. We’re suffering a crisis of confidence and any recent uptick in our revenue fortunes is based, not on our own sweat, but on the blood of Ukrainian and Russian soldiers and civilians.”
Bharath said the budget should be focused on measures to address the following:
* Create a unit that links Police, Customs, Immigration, Coast Guard and Air Guard and shares information.
* Establish specialized units in the TTPS to deal with gangs, human trafficking, gun smuggling and cybercrime
* Review the witness protection programme which is not working
* Re-establish community policing.
* Rebuild critical institutions to deliver goods and services efficiently and effectively, e.g. NIB, Licensing Office, WASA, Social Welfare, etc.
* Lower food costs by removing duties and taxes on imported inputs and properly address issues in the agricultural sector. This sector needs to be handheld, much in the same way Point Lisas was many decades ago.
* Fast track regulatory approvals and review tax regime for upstream production in the energy sector.
* Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs), particularly those involved in innovation, must be incentivized and handheld. The SME sector contributes US$11.6 billion and employs more than 200,000 people. With proper attention, both these numbers can be significantly increased.
* VAT should be replaced with sales tax. Delays in VAT repayment are crippling to all businesses, particularly SMEs.
* The education curriculum needs to be revamped immediately paying particular attention to preparing children for the jobs of the future, e.g. AI and cybersecurity, telemedicine, renewable energy, content creation, animation, and e-commerce logistics.
* T&T is currently in a hostile investment environment. The ease of doing business has deteriorated significantly over the last few years. Customs and Excise, Ports, Bureau of Standards, Chemistry, Food and Drugs Division all require overhaul for T&T to attract local and foreign investment dollars.
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