GRENADA-Opposition leader says the national budget “confused and disjointed.”

ST. GEORGE’S, Grenada, CMC – Opposition Leader, Dr. Keith Mitchell, has described the EC$1.66 billion (One EC dollar=US$0.37 cents) national budget presented to Parliament earlier this week by Finance Finance Dennis Cornwall as “a disjointed, inarticulate, rambling, confused journal of the government’s first year and a half in office.”

In delivering his response to the fiscal package, Mitchell said that it focused entirely on successful programs of his administration that lost the June 2022 general election.

“So, after one hour and forty-seven minutes, the entire country was asking when he will start going into the 2024 budget,” Mitchell told legislators.

“Therefore, I would seek to assist the Minister of Finance in explaining to this Honourable House and, by extension, the people of Grenada what is in the Estimates of Revenue and Expenditure 2024 and how it intends to help, if at all, the people of this country.

“This budget cycle is cast in a context of hyperinflation, contracted growth, increased crime and violence, unacceptably high youth unemployment, and a largely vulnerable working class. The budget read on Monday presents no response to the vulnerable segments of the population to the runaway inflation, which averages 8.7 percent for food but exceeds 15 percent on some food products.,” said Mitchell.

He told legislators, “Indeed, after reading the budget, the growing segment of our population that comprises the ‘working poor’ now knows that none of the harsh conditions that afflict their lives will be transformed for the better.”

The former prime minister recommended an evaluation of the Government’s revenues allocated to the areas affecting the country’s people.

The Opposition Leader said the Government’s failure to roll out any new initiatives solidly is evident in their debate on the implementation of projects they met in place.

“The ‘Government’s Medium-term Expenditure Objectives’ now states that the ‘Government’s transformational agenda will kick into high gear during the 2024-2026’ period. Even so, there is little or no new initiative being advanced in the forward estimates of this Government,” he said.

The Government has reported that revenue collection has surpassed the projection for 2023. However, the Opposition Leader thinks that the massive increase is due to the increased taxes rather than a general expansion of the economy.

“On domestic taxes, the Government reintroduced VAT on electricity, reintroduced the petrol tax on gas and petroleum products, placed a 15 percent VAT on sugar and sugary drinks, increased excise taxes on alcohol, increased license fees for road users, and imposed a charge on water, all of which are primary revenue earners.

“Additionally, the Government has provided an amnesty to encourage taxpayers who owe taxes to take advantage of a tax break. When we consider all those things together, the revenue performance must be seen as the combination of the ‘price effect’ of inflation, the imposition of new taxes on the people of Grenada, and also of past as well as 2023 performance of the economy. The buoyant revenue performance has masked the economy’s underperformance,” Mitchell said.