Business, labour, Opposition react to budget
With a full weekend to think about it, those people and organisations most affected by the new budget presented by Government on Friday were busy today formulating their reaction.
At newstime the executive members of the National Trade Union Congress were still meeting to decide the direction of their protest, having already concluded that the new taxes and deferral of pay raises for teachers and public employees was not to their liking. Rumours persist that a strike by those two groups of government workers would be implemented on Thursday and Friday but it remains to be seen whether the unions’ militant talk will translate into action.
On the business side of the equation the Belize Chamber of Commerce and Industry issued a release condemning the new tax measures and what it claims are a lack of financial reforms and has called an emergency meeting of its membership for Tuesday at 5:30 at the Biltmore Plaza. The private sector groups have a weaker hand than the unions in that at least the government workers can point to a broken promise of a wage increase. The business community, while faced with a hike in its tax bill, has in fact been the greatest beneficiary of Belmopan’s seven year experiment with “growth economics”, enjoying liberal development concessions and a relatively benign tax regime. Those individual industries hit by specifically targeted tax hikes–namely beer, soft drinks, realty banking and the professions–were busy today crunching the numbers to arrive at new pricing levels…and while no new figures were announced, you can be sure that they will reflect both the cost of the new levies, plus a reasonable multiplier at all levels of the distribution chain.
For its part the Opposition United Democratic Party has told News 5 that it will debate the budget at this Friday’s House meeting, even though by that time all the new tax measures rammed through in last week’s sitting will have already been passed into law by the Senate. Leader of the Opposition Dean Barrow has also written letters to the Speaker of the House and Commissioner of Police demanding action against police officer John Flores for punching Port Loyola Area Representative Anthony “Boots” Martinez. Barrow also requested that Senior officers Eduardo Wade and James Magdaleno be disciplined for interfering with Martinez as he tried to re-enter the House. All House members have the parliamentary privilege of freedom from official hindrance as they come or go from the National Assembly.
