T&T must learn to live with less over the next few years and cannot continue to budget expenditure as before since the country will be affected negatively, Independent Senator Dhanyshar Mahabir warned yesterday.
Speaking on a Variation of Finances Bill in the Senate, Mahabir added: “For instance the Integrity Commission should be abandoned since it is a drain on the public purse and other institutions, such as the Securities and Exchange Commission (SECC), must become self-financing and made to earn from the stream in which they operate.”
Mahabir said the SECC was needed and its report on the FCB IPO was needed and “the wrongdoers must be punished.” Mahabir said T&T’s number one economic problem was stagnation in the local economy which had occurred since 2008. He said from 2000 to 2008 there had been economic progress but the Clico collapse and global events of 2008 had affected it after and T&T had not fully recovered.
As a result, he said, there was now uncertainty, including where the energy market was heading and there was also high liquidity and non-borrowing as a result of stagnation. “Therefore, we cannot continue to budget as we did... so we will have to learn to live with less over the next few years or we will be spending and spending,” he added.
He said if upward patterns of expenditure continued, revenue would decline and deficits would become a permanent feature of the economy, affecting T&T’s credit worthiness and causing international ratings to decline. Mahabir, however, said he was against the Property Tax since that was tantamount to having a subsidy to rent.
He advocated: “It can’t be business as usual in this time of uncertainty and we must take evasive action in the face of uncertainty. Let’s cut expenditure instead of raising taxes, let’s eliminate the wastage, the ‘Life Sports’ and the like. We need to change budgeting.” He proposed curtailing any ministry’s excesses and asking ministries to say how a reduced allocation would affect them.
Criticising the day of “total policing” he said if it had happened in the military, those involved could have been court martialed since it was “mutiny”... since officers shut down T&T under the guise of protection.” Mahabir also “hit” delays in the public service and “mischief” which could be caused by bureaucrats. He said the administration was in the hands of people who could get away with things.
He noted recent NIB statements that the NIB board didn’t have to appear before parliamentary committees. Mahabir said he would have “hauled” them before the committee.