The Tribune

FIRST a former Health Minister, now a former Finance Minister has taken issue with the government’s plans in the Budget debate.

After Dr Duane Sands urged a realistic view of the nation’s finances if we’re going to face up to the debts we have to pay, Peter Turnquest – previously Deputy Prime Minister alongside his finance portfolio – took centre stage yesterday.

And just as with Dr Sands, he urged an approach that dealt with our situation – and wasn’t guided by “political expediency”.

It is good that such senior voices are being added to the debate – it’s just a shame that they speak so clearly as one and possibly both are leaving office.

Mr Turnquest raised a number of concerns – over new compliance measures, over tenants being left “on the hook” for the property tax debts of landlords, and more.

He also urged the creation of a service like the US Internal Revenue – which would collect taxes without fear or favour of which party someone might have connections with. After all, if we are used to seeing senior figures dodge paying what they owed, what does that do to our sense of civic duty to pay our own?

“We have to build that into our culture,” said Mr Turnquest. “It goes against political expediency and wanting to help people, but revenue management and collection has to be uppermost. It has to be all of this. The only way to get fairness and equity and collect what the state is owed.”

He’s right, of course. Some might say he could have done more about this when he was the minister, but he’s still right.

He also quite rightly raised concerns about Prime Minister Dr Hubert Minnis’ housing programme for western New Providence, calling it “inherently discriminatory” and open to a court challenge – and goodness knows this government seems to win few of those. He asks why one person buying one of those lots would have to pay full price and full customs duty for construction while their neighbour was fully exempted. There certainly seems an imbalance.

He also asked about the continued burden of state-owned enterprises swallowing up money.

We welcome such voices as Mr Turnquest’s being added to the Budget debate, especially in examining the areas in which we need to do better. It comes at a strange time, with the prospect of an election soon and political futures of a number of Parliamentarians in doubt. This is the kind of examination that a Budget should get every time. We gain nothing by pretending everything is perfect, when plainly it is not. We have big hurdles ahead of us – and suggestions of ways to improve revenue collection or to patch holes in our Budget should be welcomed. That is how we move forward.

Promises, promises

When the FNM campaigned for office in 2017, there was much talk of fiscal discipline. Goals included having entrepreneurs drive the economy, and creating an “efficient public sector” that was “essential to achieving optimal economic growth”.

One item promised to “progress public sector reform to create an efficient public service committed to improving the ease of doing business with the government”.

On coming into office, there was indeed a drive to reduce budgets for different departments and yet… now we have more workers in government than before.

The party has ended up swelling the numbers by 2,400 – with another 1,600 promoted since the FNM taking office.

There was much made of police promotions taking place just before the election last time, but with another election around the corner, those are the kind of numbers that make you wonder – especially with a promise to hire more young professionals too.

Were all these extra staff really what the FNM was promising? It certainly doesn’t seem to match up to their pledges.