PM Barrow Explains Recurrent Expenditure in 2015 Budget

Dean Barrow

Prime Minister Dean Barrow presented the 2015-2016 Budget on Friday, and it will be debated in the next two weeks. While he hasn’t officially dubbed it a budget of plenty, it’s clear from the goodies thrown in that it’s far from an austerity budget, all due to Petrocaribe money. Where there’s an apparent downside like increased recurrent expenditure, the PM says that’s easily explained by additional attention paid to critical areas like health, education and national security.

Prime Minister Dean Barrow

“The draft estimates of recurrent expenditure is proposing a total of eight hundred and seventy-four million, up by thirty-two million over the projected outturn of eight forty two million for fiscal year 2014-2015. Of this proposed amount, some three hundred and sixty-eight million is for personal emoluments, sixty million for pensions, two hundred and eleven million for goods and services, one hundred and forty-four million for subsidies and current transfers and ninety-one million for interest payments on debt. The increase in current expenditure is attributed to the following – in education, increased transfers to schools under the education sector reform program. In health, more provisions for medical supplies, the expansion of national health services to the Corozal District, and for the new twenty-four hour service of the San Pedro Polyclinic. In National Security – to fund the additional intakes for both the Coast Guard and the Police force, and also for increased allowances for the Police, overdue increased allowances for the Police to right a historical injustice, and to put them on par with the rest of the Public Service in terms of allowances.”