BELIZE CITY, Thurs. Feb. 10, 2022– An almost 6-hour-long Senate meeting held yesterday ended with the Government of Belize’s 70-million-dollar supplementary appropriation being read a third time and passed in the upper house. As reported, this is the third supplementary budget brought by this PUP administration since entering government, with the first additional allocation of funds being sought in October 2021. In December, the government returned to parliament to once more access additional funding, and now it is doing so again in early February, just a little less than two months before the new budget for the coming fiscal year is read.
Prior to outlining to the Senate how the additional funds are to be allocated, Lead Government Senator, Hon. Eamon Courtenay, very aware of the optics of a third request for extra funds by GoB, prefaced his explanation of the mainline items on the budget by stating, “In anticipation of the grandstanding, I want, Madam President, to explain for the benefit of those who intend to perpetrate mischief, the main items in the supplementary.” He then went on to refer to the $23 million (as reported in the Tuesday issue of the AMANDALA) that is being allocated to the Ministry of Health and Wellness as a part of this supplementary budget: “The first one, Madam President, under head 19:121 Medical Supplies, fifteen point five million, addresses the purchasing of drugs for the public service. It is stated right there, materials and supplies, pharmaceuticals, and consumables. And, before mischief-makers take to the floor, let me make it abundantly clear that there are a number of amounts stated under the subhead, ‘contracts and consultancy’. No appropriation is being made for any consultancy. All of these under the Ministry of Health, we are told, are for contracts for the supply of services and goods, not consultancy. It is styled ‘contracts and consultancies’ simply because that is the heading that is given to that subhead,” he said.
In reference to that amount being sought for medical supplies, however, Senator Darrell Bradley pointed out that the “devil is in the details,” and he noted that for the preceding 11 months the government had budgeted just 10 million dollars for the purchase of pharmaceuticals and supplies in the Health Ministry, but is now, at this late juncture, asking for $15 million more, just one month before the new budget is read.
”The devil is in the details. The government is coming to this house to ask for the approval of the house to allocate in one month an additional 15 million dollars for pharmaceuticals and supplies, in circumstances where the entire year’s budget 11 months was only 10 million dollars. With the absence of any explanation, just the figure, so that, with respect, but to tout the idea that this is transparency, in my view, is not accurate,” Senator Bradley said.
He further commented, “I will not respond to anything that he would say that the United Democratic Party has done [in reference to the PUP’s insistence that the previous UDP administration had accessed large amounts of supplementary funding for the budget without formally getting the approval of parliament], but I will say that if we are debating this budget allocation and the government is asking for an additional 15 million dollars in the final month, in order for me to vote in favor of that, I need to have details, I need to know why.”
Senator Christopher Coye, during his address to the Senate, however, revealed that a portion of the funds will be used to cover unpaid expenses incurred by the past administration. “That 15.5 million in a sense is a bit of a catching up, because of payables [from] the past administration that had not been paid. 5 million were taken out of the approved estimates to pay those past payables, so this 15 million, a portion of that has to account for what is accrued for this year,” he said.
While the sizable allocation of funding to the Ministry of Health and Wellness was hotly debated, Senator Michael Peyrefitte focused on the other spending to be done with the supplementary funds, including the purchase of vehicles and the repairs being done to various sections of the office of the Prime Minister.
“Purchase of vehicles—$750,000 they have spent already for the year budgeted for; they come back one month before a new budget is to be read after spending $750,000 worth of vehicles. They are asking now for $733,000 worth of vehicles now. Taking us to just under 1.5 million dollars for the year. So you can look at public servants, can’t give them increments, telling them to wait, we are all punishing in this together, we are all taking this lick, but I as the prime minister get to sit on $45,000 worth of furniture and get 1.5 million dollars worth of vehicles. You really think that’s going to fly with the Belizean people? Some of the expenses make no sense, and some of them go to projects that you didn’t allocate a penny for the entire year,” Senator Peyrefitte said.
He also made reference to budgeted allocations to cover personal emoluments for the office of the Director of Public Prosecution (DPP).
“The numbers don’t lie, and the intent of the government cannot be hidden. When you look, Madam President, general administration, personal emoluments for the D.P.P. office, a hundred and sixty-seven thousand dollars—for what? You didn’t know that in December? And if they wah come with scratch records, Madam President, then the music has to scratch. Because, if you show no creativity and no new ways of growing the economy, like the current Prime Minister criticized the previous Prime Minster for not doing, then you are going to hear the same thing as well. You have personal emoluments, you can’t give the people their ten percent back, you can’t give people their pay, but you can hire more people,” Hon. Peyrefitte commented.
The Senator representing the country’s unions, Elena Smith, also noted the additional hiring being done by GoB, despite the moratorium on hiring and 10% salary cuts endured by government-paid workers.
“I see that we have funds set aside for personal emoluments. I am being told that we are requesting more funds, and I understand that there are new persons being hired. Well, I came here today, and I saw a new person here, so I don’t know if that is a new hire or if that is an old person that came back, I don’t know. But, in any event, we heard about the Director of Public Prosecution, we are hearing about honorariums. Yet, Madam President, a year ago, the same people who are coming to say that these people need to get their honorariums came to me and said to my colleagues that we must sacrifice because all of us must share in the pain. So, how is it that all of us were to share in the pain but not all of us can share in the honorariums? It cannot be,” Senator Smith stated.
In the end, Senator Smith, along with the senators representing the Opposition, did not support the supplementary allocation, and she specifically cited a lack of information on the government’s part as the reason she was withholding her support.
“We don’t come to the Senate to just go against or vote against what is presented. We do our very best to support what comes to us, but we can only support if we have enough information. When we are asking legitimate questions, we ought to be given the responses,” she said.
Senator Courtenay noted during the session, however, that the supplementary budget they were reviewing was an indication that the current administration is complying with the provisions in the Constitution by seeking the approval of the National Assembly before accessing extra funds.
“The supplementary appropriation bill is before the Senate to comply with the law of the country. The supplementary appropriation bill is before the Senate because we have had inherited expenses and expenditure and a broken public service that needs to be repaired and this government is judiciously and prudentially appropriating monies in order to rebuild the government, public service and the wider economy of this country. The supplementary appropriation bill is before this Senate because we have committed to seeking the approval of the honorable House of Representatives and the Senate prior to expenditure whenever it is possible and required by law,” Senator Courtenay said.
He also mentioned that the government is making efforts to organize a system through which the Senate can have meetings as a committee to discuss the details of these types of bills before they are presented in the upper house. The bill was passed at the end of the day’s debate.