Prime Minister, the Right Honourable Freundel Stuart (left) listens as Democratic Labour Party candidate for St. Michael North-East, Patrick Todd makes a point during the party’s joint branch meeting at Lawrence T. Gay Primary on Sunday evening.
THERE can be no Easter without Good Friday.
A biblical reference made by Prime Minister the Rt Hon Freundel Stuart on Sunday, the start of Holy Week as he highlighted the lows and highs which people, organisations and even countries face as a part of the human journey.
He was speaking at Lawrence T. Gay Primary during a joint branch meeting in support of candidate for St.Michael North East Patrick Todd, where he highlighted the Easters and Good Fridays experienced by Barbados in the forms of recessions in the 1980s, 1990s and more recently the global financial meltdown within the last decade.
If that were not enough, Prime Minister Stuart noted that the island’s public finances took another hit from legislative decisions taken by Canada which affected Barbados’ International Business and Financial Services Sector. “And that resulted in this country losing upwards of 200 million per year for the last six or seven years. So over nearly 1.5 billion in corporate tax revenue Barbados had to given up as a result of those decisions taken in Canada. The Canadian government has to look after its own interests and we have to look after ours,” he stated.
Taking that blow of losing $1.5 billion in that seven year period, he said in order to maintain the programmes that have been enjoyed over the last 50 years, serious decisions had to be taken. “Politics is ultimately about choices.”
“Either since we lost upward of 200 million in revenue every year, that we were going to get our public finances back in balance by cutting out expenditure of upward of 200 million in which case we would have had to cut back on education, health, social care, defence and
security cut back on housing and of course cutting back on those things would mean cutting back on jobs as well.”
“We had to make either that choice or we had to decide that we wanted to continue to provide those things for the masses of the people of Barbados and therefore rather than cutting back and cutting out that we would try to recover that upwards of 200 million by asking
people to pay a little more by way of taxation.”
“Freundel Jerome Stuart took the decision that declaring war on the households of Barbados by cutting our expenditure by upwards of 200 million could not work for him and could not work for the country. Therefore I decided and the Cabinet agreed with me, that we would ask Barbadians to pay a little more to ensure that we would continue to provide the level of services to which people of this country have become accustomed.”
Prime Minister Stuart said it is known that the introduction or increase in taxes is never well-received. “We all wish that we all could go through life without having to pay taxes. But remember what I just said, there is no Easter without Good Friday. If we wanted the Easter of continuing to enjoy all the benefits that we enjoy at our polyclinics, the QEH, housing, Social Care and Community Development, all the benefits we enjoy in National Security.”
“If we wanted that Easter the Good Friday would involve carrying a little more of the weight in terms of taxes. Nobody in this room, not one person in this room can employ his or her own Police Force, you cannot employ your own Transport Board or Sanitation Services Authority, you cannot run your own school for your own child on any consistent basis. These are shared benefits which a society provides and which have to be contributed to by the taxes,” he said. “Easter does not come free. In order to get to Easter you have to pass through Good Friday,” he reiterated.
Commending the candidate for St. Michael North East Patrick Todd, Prime Minister Stuart noted that he and his opponent Opposition Leader Mia Mottley sat in the same Mathematics class at secondary school and there is equality in their intellectual capacity.
He said Todd brings to the constituency not only a robust personal integrity and a staggering capacity for hard work but he brings his experience having already served as a Member of Parliament in the City of Bridgetown and also having served as a Minister of the Crown for the last ten years. “He is at present a Minister in the Prime Minister’s Office, he works for me and I feel able to vouch unreservedly for Patrick Todd,” he said.
Stuart who has not yet announced a date for elections once again assured, “Not too long from now I will let the Governor General know when I want nomination day to be and when I want polling day to be.” He said once these issues have been resolved he will be returning to St. Michael North East to speak more on the current representative of that constituency. (JH)