Acting Central Bank Governor, Cleviston Haynes, left, listens to a point from Prime Minister the Right Honourable Freundel Stuart, during the start of the Week of Excellence at the Grande Salle yesterday.
The new man at the helm of the Central Bank wants to see a renewed focus on efficiency in the public sector.
In his first public address since taking up the post, Acting Governor, Cleviston Haynes, told those gathered for the launch of the Week of Excellence at the Grande Salle yesterday morning, there are encouraging signs over the medium-term in respect to the island’s economic growth, “provided that we are able to tackle our macroeconomic imbalances”.
He pointed out, currently the centre of the debate is on the public sector budget which was over $3 billion, leading to questions as to whether there was value for money and on the efficiency of service delivery, with several suggestions including privatization, and the enhancement in the delivery channels of goods and services to a more customer-centric experience.
Furthermore, Haynes said that while there were demands being made to reform the public sector, there was no doubt that more will be required from this area over the next 50 years to push economic activity.
“As a small open economy dependent on the ability to export goods for our well-being, an efficient public sector is indispensable to improve private sector competitiveness,” he contended.
Later, the acting Governor said, “The challenge for us therefore is to see how we can improve the speed and cost effectiveness in the delivery of public services, so that these complaints are a thing of the past. I believe that there is still much scope for the undying delivery of services, so that citizens won’t have to wait in lines to effect payment of goods and services at great cost to productivity in itself, but we must also focus on how to implement other far-reaching improvements, that might aid business facilitation and improve the attractiveness of doing business in Barbados. The interdependence of the private and public sectors is critical to the acceleration of the growth rate,” he said.
Haynes underlined the importance of the social partnership, noting “they must stand fast and hold together”, while pledging the bank’s continued support to actively collaborate with the group. (JMB)