Akash Sama­roo

Lead Ed­i­tor-Pol­i­tics

akash.sama­roo@cnc3.co.tt

In­de­pen­dent Sen­a­tor Dr Mar­lene Attzs warned that the Gov­ern­ment’s 2026 Bud­get rais­es se­ri­ous con­cerns about fis­cal re­spon­si­bil­i­ty, par­tic­u­lar­ly its plan to fi­nance near­ly $19 bil­lion in new bor­row­ing with­out clear ex­pla­na­tion.

Con­tribut­ing to the bud­get de­bate in the Sen­ate yes­ter­day, Dr Attzs, an econ­o­mist by pro­fes­sion, told the Up­per House, “It is con­cern­ing that the bud­get pre­sent­ed by the Ho­n­ourable (Fi­nance) Min­is­ter did not men­tion the Gov­ern­ment’s in­ten­tion to bor­row to fi­nance some of its ex­pen­di­tures. The draft es­ti­mates list $18.96 bil­lion in new bor­row­ing.”

Sen­a­tor Attzs said while bor­row­ing is un­avoid­able in an econ­o­my fac­ing per­sis­tent rev­enue short­falls, she said she was con­cerned with what she de­scribed as a change in the com­po­si­tion of the bor­row­ing.

“In re­cent years, Gov­ern­ment debt has been large­ly do­mes­ti­cal­ly fi­nanced, from lo­cal banks. The 2026 Es­ti­mates now point to a piv­ot to­ward for­eign bor­row­ing. Of the $18.96 bil­lion to be bor­rowed, $8.1 bil­lion will be on the do­mes­tic mar­ket and $10.8 bil­lion on the in­ter­na­tion­al mar­ket.”

Attzs warned that this shift in com­po­si­tion of bor­row­ing will bring high­er costs, greater ex­change-rate risk and re­pay­ment oblig­a­tions in for­eign cur­ren­cy.

“For the ben­e­fit of the cit­i­zens of Trinidad and To­ba­go, let me be pel­lu­cid­ly clear, each US dol­lar bor­rowed to­day must be re­paid in US dol­lars to­mor­row,” she posit­ed.

Dr Attzs ques­tioned, “How will these debts be ser­viced with­out wors­en­ing the for­eign-ex­change strain or dri­ving the debt-to-GDP ra­tio high­er?”

The In­de­pen­dent Sen­a­tor said if the gov­ern­ment piv­ots to in­creased for­eign debt, the im­pli­ca­tion will mean that this coun­try must earn or save those dol­lars through ex­ports, re­serves or fur­ther bor­row­ing.

How­ev­er, she fur­ther warned, “If those in­flows of forex do not ma­te­ri­alise, cur­rent and fu­ture gen­er­a­tions will shoul­der the bur­den through de­val­u­a­tion pres­sure or high­er tax­a­tion. Be­cause every bor­rowed dol­lar to­day is a promise to re­pay in scarce US dol­lars to­mor­row, eco­nom­ic fair­ness de­mands that is a promise that will have to be kept.”

Shift­ing to em­ploy­ment, Attzs said, while the bud­get pro­pos­es to re­place CEPEP and URP with an Em­ploy­ment Fund promis­ing bet­ter paid jobs, this rais­es se­ri­ous ques­tions.

She asked, “What has been the mul­ti­pli­er ef­fect of re­mov­ing in­come from thou­sands of house­holds for more than 100 days? Has the abrupt loss of in­come among these af­fect­ed work­ers dis­rupt­ed the school­ing of their chil­dren? In oth­er words, have the chil­dren of dis­placed work­ers been able to con­tin­ue at­tend­ing school reg­u­lar­ly?

Can these fam­i­lies af­ford food, rent, and ne­ces­si­ties? Has this in­come shock pushed sin­gle-par­ent house­holds deep­er in­to pover­ty? What are the cri­te­ria and tran­si­tion­al arrange­ments for the new Fund?”

The sen­a­tor said these are not par­ti­san ques­tions but rather hu­man ones.

Mean­while, com­ment­ing on the bud­get in its en­tire­ty and in­tent, the In­de­pen­dent Sen­a­tor said, “That peo­ple-cen­tred ap­proach is com­mend­able, but a cred­i­ble bud­get must go be­yond good in­ten­tions. It must show how the Gov­ern­ment in­tends to con­front our most press­ing re­al­i­ties, crime, for­eign ex­change short­ages and ris­ing debt. On these counts, I felt Bud­get 2026 falls short.”