Opposition leader Kamla Persad-Bissessar today released the opposition’s response to Monday’s Budget submitted by Finance Minister Colm Imbert.
Thank you, Madam Speaker, and thank this court for the opportunity to contribute to this debate on the government’s fourth budget report.
I hope that in the proceedings, first of all, I would like to extend my deepest sincere words to the staff of my Opposition Leader’s Office, my staff in the Siparia constituency office, all opposition members and their staff, opposition senators, UNC members, city councilors, and councillors. thank. UNC national executives, district executives and activists are all over Trinidad and Tobago.
I would also like to thank the many stakeholders and many citizens, in their personal capacity or through various commercial organizations or non-governmental organizations, CBOs, FBOs, and trade unions, for their help in the response I prepared here today, through us They have provided much-needed feedback during multiple pre-budget consultations held across the country in the past few weeks.
Their reflection and reality, their suggestions and wishes, their suggestions and demands, their demands and concerns, I and my large opposition party team are actively considering them, and what I answer on their behalf is the blessings and direct opinions of the people. Today .
I promise that I will continue to be your voice, I stand by your side, I stand with you, and I support you.
From these extensive consultations and media comments, we identified common key issues, including out-of-control crime, employment and economics, healthcare, education, infrastructure, governance, quality of life, and of course Petrotrin in my contribution today I will discuss some of them.
During the debate, members of our side will also study these and other sectors in detail based on their shadow investment portfolios.
In addition, Madam Speaker, today, I would like to take this opportunity to share with you some of our comprehensive plans for national progress, progress and transformation.
We have a vision of Trinidad and Tobago, so that every citizen can enjoy a better quality of life, more prosperous, safer, access to quality medical care and improve equal opportunities for all.
We will redesign our society, from a society that has to protest for roads, drains, and water, to a society that is inherently aspiring.
We will readjust their chaos caused by government mismanagement and incompetence.
We will restore Trinidad and Tobago to prosperity, not they will make us a failed country.
We will start working immediately, and we will ensure that their unemployed and poor can also return to work.
We will do this by rebalancing our finances and reforming our institutions, paying special attention to the state-owned enterprise sector, and most importantly, we will do all this with the people at the center. This is the most important priority of our government. .
With hard work, determination and a shared vision, we can change our country and ensure that every citizen of Trinidad and Tobago has a brighter future.
But madam, before I share our plan, we need to first identify the problems we face so that we can discuss how to deal with them.
After 4 PNM budgets, these are some of the questions raised during the consultations and the answers received.
Let Hansard’s record show that three years after the PNM regime in 2018, they have returned to the politics of the past, binding most of the working-class citizens of this country to the lives of the working poor, with almost no prospect of social mobility.
In fact, in the extensive consultations I mentioned, a common theme is how people feel completely betrayed by their prime minister and the government, just as the savior Jesus was betrayed by Judas for thirty silver!
They feel abandoned and oppressed by the policies of alienation and impoverishment being implemented, and they have lost trust in the government’s genuine pursuit of their best interests as citizens.
With the closing of the Petrotrin Refinery, our nation’s greatest modern heritage, we may now be at the greatest crossroads in our nation’s history.
People say that they are now reluctant, fragile and helpless pawns, victims of the incompetence of this government, because the government is plunged our country into one of the most serious social and economic crises in its history.
They feel betrayed, betrayed, and ungrateful towards the citizens who put you there-this is the legacy of the PNM government led by Raleigh.
As I have proved through economic reference, comparison and contrast, as well as the perfidiousness and outright lies of this administration, I dare to say that they violated the social contract with the people who elected them to best represent their democratic rights and interests. On the contrary, this government repaid this sacred trust with a policy of destruction and tyranny.
Against this background, Madam Speaker, I have chosen the theme of my speech today-at the crossroads of our country’s history-a country in crisis: a collapsed government; a betrayed person.
Madam Speaker, I said that we will solve the problems we face first, and then study what needs to be done. In this case, I will study the vital signs of the economy.
The most critical and common measure of economic health is gross domestic product, also known as GDP. This is the heartbeat of the economy.
The Minister of Finance held up his chest, smirked at the people, looked at the GDP, and boasted in a normal way that “the economy of Trinidad and Tobago is expected to grow by 1.9% in real terms in 2019”. (The 2019 budget presentation, page 2).
On this basis, the Minister praised that the economy is undergoing a “real economic turnaround”, thanks to his sound fiscal and financial management.
This is actually a repetition of this “transition” that he announced for the first time in his mid-year review.
Let me make it very clear that if the economy improves and the quality of life of all our citizens improves, no one will be happier than me. However, we know that we cannot believe anything the minister said.
Looking at the Minister’s own statistics, I found evidence of Minister Imbert’s usual statistical gymnastics.
Thanks to the policies of this administration, the economy of Trinidad and Tobago has been far from expanding in the past three years and has actually shrunk.
In 2018, three years after the PNM under the leadership of Minister Imbert, the real GDP was 159.2 billion US dollars, a decrease of 11.2 billion US dollars over the past three years. (2018 Economic Review, page 80, Appendix 1)
Any child of Standard 1 will tell you that 159 is less than 170. But the finance minister brags stupidly about recovery!
We now have the numbers, and the population of Trinidad and Tobago can now be clearly seen without any improvement.
This means that under Minister Imbert’s management, the economy has actually shrunk by 6.5% in the past three years.
In fact, according to the Minister’s own data, GDP at current prices is lower than the levels in 2012, 2013, 2014 and 2015.
Under his leadership, today’s economy is 10% smaller than in 2014. This is the last year of our People’s Government in power.
However, the minister does not want you to see his tenure. The minister prefers that we only look at last year’s 2017 and compare it with this year’s 2018.
Minister Imbert wants us to forget that they have been in power since September 2015. It was this government that destroyed the economy.
But when you look at the difference between last year’s and this year’s GDP, the difference is even more obvious.
Do you know the reasons for the increase in GDP data last year and this year? A component called tax minus product subsidies increased by 30.7%! Therefore, the minister claimed to develop the economy by increasing taxes last year! It has nothing to do with income generation and job creation.
The economic growth that the minister boasted was due to increased tax burdens on citizens and businesses! Value-added tax, green fund and business tax, corporate tax, abolition of fuel subsidies, tire tax, online purchase tax, alcohol tax, tobacco tax, inspection fee, environmental tax, gaming tax…all these taxes, Madam Speaker.
According to this measure, they believe that the more taxes he levies on you, the better the economic growth, and the minister is now relying on the implementation of the property tax in 2019 to promote economic growth next year.
Not surprisingly, Minister Imbert recently promised in an interview that the new tax will not be levied until after 2020. You know, he is right because we will take office in 2020. He concealed the fact that his desperate pursuit of a new property tax (when he will tax it). Until your chicken coop, kennel and toilet) will adversely affect the pockets and disposable income of every citizen. When they stated in 2019 that they would implement a property tax, it was hypocritical to say that the new tax would not be levied.
Well, let’s look at the numbers. From 2015 to 2017, the mining and quarrying industry decreased by USD 5 billion, construction contracts decreased by USD 1 billion, trade and maintenance contracts decreased by USD 6 billion, and transportation and storage contracts decreased by nearly USD 1 billion.
Under the leadership of this government, all these departments have suffered severe contraction. The minister touted the success of the manufacturing industry, but he did not tell us that he now classifies petroleum and chemical products that previously belonged to the energy sector.
However, even if an additional nearly $1.5 billion from petroleum and chemical products is used to expand the manufacturing industry, the changes in the industry are minimal.
Post time: Jul-30-2021