Public Service Union Calls Out G.O.B. on Wasteful Spending
Dean Flowers
The Public Service Union and the Belize National Teachers will meet with the Prime Minister, Dean Barrow on Wednesday to iron out issues regarding the government’s proposed cost-saving measures. G.O.B. is proposing that public servants including teachers forego their increment while ministers give up a month’s salary. Ministers, C.E.O.s, and Heads of Departments will also be giving up fifty percent of their allowances. The Prime Minister on Friday stated that the ministers, C.E.O.s and H.O.D.s are giving up far more than the public servants. Barrow also told the P.S.U. to stop being unreasonable. First Vice President for the P.S.U. Dean Flowers says that the Prime Minister has been ill-advised and is not seeing the picture clearly. Flowers reminded the PM that the P.S.U. has for years been suggesting that G.O.B. cut down on wasteful spending. This morning on Open Your Eyes, Flowers zeroed in on the Ministry of Housing which he says has not built a single house in the last decade.
Dean Flowers, First Vice President, P.S.U.
“I have no seen the Ministry of Housing build a single house over the last ten years yet we are paying a C.E.O. in the Ministry of Housing and full complement of staff. I will ask question, to do what? The Ministry of Human Development has taken over most of the roles and responsibilities previously that were being executed by the Ministry of Housing. So as far as I am concerned, we can save for example immediately a hundred thousand dollars y sending the home the C.E.O. in the Ministry of Housing because he has absolutely nothing to do. And that is a fact. What is the private sector giving up? The private sector as we know it did not fulfill fifty two percent of their obligations of their tax payments. There is no reason why the private sector who enjoys these tax holiday, these tax exemptions, these tax breaks only paid forty eight percent that was paid in 2019. Is it that all of these businesses close down? Why is it that we barrowed fourteen million dollars to amalgamate the Belize Tax Service Department and they had a shortfall of fifty two percent of tax revenue between April 2020 and April 2019. It is clearly saying that we are not getting value for money and we are paying people more than what they deserve to be paid. The Prime Minister did an excellent job, I don’t know who all swallowed the pill, in trying to paint the public servants in a negative light but we are here to clarify that. We have been clarifying that and we have been showing the numbers that public servants would be giving up in some cases three and four times more that any cabinet minister would be giving up.”
We’ll keep you posted on the meeting on Wednesday.
