| New $178 million budget predicts $13 million deficit | | Print | |
| Written by Richard Green/richard@fptci.com | |||
| Thursday, 21 April 2011 10:39 | |||
 The Turks and Caicos Islands interim government budget is $33 million less than last year — a 15.6 percent decrease — but still projects a $13 million deficit. The operating budget of $171,404,467 is projected to have an $8 million deficit, while the $6,406,650 capital budget could have a $5 million shortfall, Permanent Secretary of Finance Delton Jones said at a press conference April 13. The shortage of government income to pay bills is considerably less than the $60 million for the prior fiscal year. The target is to eliminate deficits and generate a surplus by the financial year ending March 2013. That achievement is one of the requirements the U.K. has set before the TCI government will be returned to elected officials. His Excellency the Gov. Gordon Wetherell enacted the new budget earlier this month without a public review by the Consultative Forum. Chairwoman Lillian Missick canceled the April 5 budget meeting, saying several members were not attending and there would not be a quorum. Six members said they did not have enough time to properly consider the budget and had asked for a week’s postponement. The government has not yet put the detailed budget on its website for public review, but the budget ordinance shows where the money will be spent. The biggest expenditure will be in the area of health care, which will cost more than $43 million this year — one fourth of all government spending. Education and youth departments will account for 13.7 percent of government spending at more than $23 million, of which $5.4 million will go to tertiary and further education. A recent government review showed that more than a third of students on scholarships were paid more than they were entitled to, and almost two thirds had been studying, or completed their studies, beyond the scholarship period specified in their agreements. The Ministry of Education is preparing proposals to replace the existing programme with a new scheme that will focus on the “brightest and best” students who would otherwise be unable to access higher education. Police operations get the third largest share of the budget, with $15.7 million going toward police and $2.2 million to Her Majesty’s Prison on Grand Turk. Spending for pensions and gratuities is set at $7.1 million, or 4 percent of all government spending. This is one area where the interim government has implemented needed reforms seeking to reduce expenditures. Due to oversights and lax controls, some civil servants have been receiving double pensions, costing the government more than $600,000 a year, the government says. Some civil servants who had retired from public service and were then re-employed, drawing both a pension and a salary. Click here to read the budget ordinance.
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