Gail Alexan­der

Se­nior Po­lit­i­cal Re­porter

For­mer prime min­is­ter Stu­art Young says while the Gov­ern­ment’s de­ci­sion to re­duce the cost of Su­per gaso­line by $1 is a good mea­sure, the Bud­get did not pro­vide mon­ey for any 10 per cent wage in­crease and the ad­min­is­tra­tion’s fir­ing of CEPEP and URP work­ers seems to have racial un­der­tones.

“The Bud­get is a pop­ulist bud­get meant to fool the pop­u­la­tion, smoke and mir­rors,” Young added in com­ments on the Bud­get via Face­book yes­ter­day.

He pre­dict­ed a rise in the cost of liv­ing and in­fla­tion due to some tax­es that will be passed on to the pub­lic.

Young said, “The eco­nom­ic ef­fect of Bud­get 2026 is go­ing to be ris­ing in­fla­tion and more loss of jobs. I will start by say­ing that the de­ci­sion to re­duce the cost of Su­per fu­el at the pump by $1 is a good mea­sure.

“But where is the rev­enue to af­ford it all go­ing to come from? The oil price they have used of $73.25 is not re­al­is­tic, and there will be se­ri­ous short­falls in that pro­ject­ed rev­enue and a se­ri­ous lack of cash flow. They have set that un­re­al­is­tic oil price to raid the Her­itage and Sta­bil­i­sa­tion Fund.

“There are no re­al rev­enue gen­er­a­tors in the Bud­get - all of the rev­enue gen­er­a­tors are new tax­es and fines. Add to that, there are no new mea­sures, which will stim­u­late the econ­o­my.”

He added, “Painful­ly, this Gov­ern­ment con­tin­ues to per­se­cute the more vul­ner­a­ble in our so­ci­ety. The Gov­ern­ment says that they are shut­ting down URP and CEPEP, which are pro­grammes that do em­ploy peo­ple. There are re­al peo­ple who de­pend on those pro­grammes for jobs, and these cit­i­zens are the most vul­ner­a­ble in so­ci­ety.

“The Gov­ern­ment is at­tempt­ing to sell this pol­i­cy de­ci­sion as a fight against crim­i­nal­i­ty but have pro­vid­ed no ev­i­dence of this, and if it ex­ists, then tack­le that. They’ve fired tens of thou­sands who are not as­so­ci­at­ed with crim­i­nal­i­ty and cor­rup­tion. It al­so seems to have racial un­der­tones, and this is some­thing cit­i­zens must keep their eye on. The claim of new and per­ma­nent em­ploy­ment will go to whom? UNC sup­port­ers?”

Young said Gov­ern­ment al­so did not pro­vide mon­ey for a 10 per cent wage in­crease.

“So, where is the mon­ey go­ing to come from? The Min­is­ter said FCB, Re­pub­lic Bank, and NIB, re­al­ly? Al­so, is it re­al­ly the 10 per cent in­crease they promised pub­lic ser­vants, ie, for one ne­go­ti­a­tion pe­ri­od, or is it 10 per cent for two pe­ri­ods where PNM of­fered four per cent and five per cent?

“The Gov­ern­ment has said it is go­ing to in­ter­fere with the board and con­trol of Re­pub­lic Bank. They have al­ready done this with FCB. Cit­i­zens need to be con­cerned about this. The UNC has al­ready at­tacked the Cen­tral Bank and FCB, and now says Re­pub­lic Bank is next. These in­sti­tu­tions are crit­i­cal to our sta­bil­i­ty and should not be in­ter­fered with.”

He said the new tax­es on LPG, banks, in­sur­ance com­pa­nies, and land­lords’ rentals will all be passed down to the av­er­age man by busi­ness­es.

“This means the cost of liv­ing is go­ing to go up for the av­er­age man. For in­stance, busi­ness­es whose elec­tric­i­ty cost goes up will even­tu­al­ly pass it on­to the price of goods (eg, gro­cery stores and fast-food restau­rants). Land­lords who have to pay the new prop­er­ty tax will pass that in­creased cost on­to the ten­ant. It is ex­pect­ed that banks and In­sur­ance com­pa­nies will al­so pass on the in­creased cost of the new tax to cus­tomers. The high­er cost of LPG will al­so im­pact fast food restau­rants with an in­crease in prices, so again, high­er cost of food and high­er cost of liv­ing equals in­fla­tion!”

And while the To­ba­go House of As­sem­bly Chief Sec­re­tary and his team were elat­ed with the Bud­get al­lo­ca­tion, Young has urged cau­tion.

“To­ba­go bet­ter hope they get their mon­ey, as I pre­dict the Gov­ern­ment is go­ing to fall short with rev­enue and cash flows and strug­gle to pro­vide THA with their quar­ter­ly block pay­ments,” he said.

“Last­ly, not sur­pris­ing­ly, there is ab­solute­ly noth­ing new in the en­er­gy sec­tor. Every sin­gle ini­tia­tive they re­ferred to was done and put in place by the PNM gov­ern­ment. Every sin­gle one.”

Fi­nance Min­is­ter Dave Tan­coo did not im­me­di­ate­ly re­ply to Young’s state­ments. But oth­er Gov­ern­ment of­fi­cials who did, said Young need­ed to hold his “quar­relling un­til the Bud­get de­bate, where de­tails are giv­en.”