Weekly Column

The results are in. Nation readers have spoken. Seventy-one percent of them have the same opinion of this year’s Budget – “Not So Good.” The figures might be skewed if only because there was no opportunity to vote for a bad budget. Nevertheless, there is no doubt that in this case, for this Budget, not so good equals bad.

As the effects of the Budget start to sink in, all the talk about social engineering will not replace absent policy for the international business sector or tourism, our chief bill payers. It will not clarify fuzzy economic strategies or vague platitudes about northern airports or offshore islands. Neither will it bring relief from the onslaught of new taxes imposed by the two rookie Ministers of Finance.

Individually and collectively Barbadians are in for a very rough ride when it need not be so. Every week is now going to be budget week for Bajans as taxes consume more and more of their pay packets. And to what end? Where are David Thompson and Darcy Boyce taking us? Back to the waiting arms of the IMF?

Well we’ve been there and done that and it was not a pleasant experience. Without so much as a blink or a blush, the Prime Minister himself predicted further price increases and job losses by yearend. Stagflation is about to become the latest buzzword as growth in critical sectors starts to wither. To quote Richard Moody, an American economist, “ There’s not enough lipstick to put on this pig.”

And don’t be fooled by talk of imported inflation. The greater inflationary effects of this year’s Budget are home grown right here at Bay Street. From higher license fees in almost every category, to increases in the environmental levy on every single item sold, to millions more in VAT - not a single cent can be blamed on the price of oil or imported food. These are solely the result of rookie tax policies that do not apparently take into account their impact on people’s lives.

There was a time when Bajans expected their Government to protect the vulnerable, not for the Government itself to be leading the charge of impoverishment, job losses, failed mortgages, business bankruptcies and higher and higher commodity prices. Times sure have changed. Just ask Serenader or RPB. Perhaps PricewaterhouseCoopers will be more prophetic than they know and we will all have to become our brother’s keeper, for it is clear that apart from carving out a few interest groups to bolster his Party’s image and voter appeal, the Prime Minister has a blinkered view of economic prosperity for the rest of us. He does not subscribe to the view that you have to help the productive sectors so that everyone can be helped.

There is a pervasive current throughout the budgetary proposals, both in revenue raising and concessionary measures that its either authors are not seized of the big economic picture or have a deliberately myopic view for purely political ends. Neither is good for the country.

We pledge again to hold the Prime Minister’s feet to the fire for the good of all Barbadians, regardless of political persuasion. We will not let him squander what Bajans have worked so hard to achieve with tawdry economic policies and programmes designed to keep him self and his Party in power while the nation suffers.

It was in this spirit that our Leader warned over a thousand residents of Christ Church last Sunday about the Cost-U-Less Trojan Horse. A good time to reflect on the old saying “Cheap ‘ting no good. Good ‘ting no cheap.” Especially if it means the demise of hundreds of small middlemen shop keepers and mini marts.