Interview on Voice of Barbados with Minister of Finance Chris Sinckler, the interviewer is David Ellis: Part 1, Part II.
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David, hopefully the Minister will indicate today WHEN small businesses like ours are going to be paid agreed outstanding VAT refunds, which in our case having been due for over 3 years and 8 months.
And before a party supporter states that the private sector owes MILLIONS.,that is not our problem if a bloated, recession proof civil service cannot collect what is due, then clearly they are not doing their jobs.
David,
DONE!
In the 2012 budget, a Hotel Refurbishment Fund was proposed. Does anyone know if this fund was implemented and its monetary value?
Otherwise, we perhaps should just treat the 2013 Budget with a pinch of salt.
Would an earlier implementation of such a fund, helped kept Almond Beach Village open?
This interview puts a lot on the line for Sinckler. He has loss a lot of credibility on the Barrack, Four Seasons, CLICO, years of consecutive decline and many other issues. People are tired of promises. Let us map out an action plan and go down the road. While the government may be forgiven for holding for 2-3 years it is clear that is a strategy which will not take us over the hump in the current scenario.
Should be an interesting programme. Let’s see if he can resist his usual temptations and leave the politics/blame out of it for once. Barbadians want straight talk and answers.
Observing
I think we are going to be most impressed by the MoF’s ‘Frank-like performance in allying the fears of Bajans; but unlike the Governor of the Bank he will be more upbeat and optimistic is confirming the following:-
The foreign reserves are still healthy and improving as a result of better than expected arrivals for our well promoted and marketed Cropover season.
There is no threat of any devaluation now or in the future.
The Four Seasons project is progressing at an acceptable level as private sector players put the finishing touches to the deal that would not involve government funding decisions.
The Almond reopening is very much on the cards with the technocrats working at fever pitch to conclude the necessary planning and associated paper work.
Despite contrary advice from the Governor of the Central Bank (who by the way is my creation to appoint or disappoint) there will be no sharp swift approach to cutting the fat from the public sector. We have reviewed that $400 million figure and found it to be absolutely not necessary but some of the cuts would be phased in over the coming fiscal years up to 2016.
There will be No layoffs or would this government undertake any privatization strategies to undermine the social fabric of the country and disadvantage the poor black man.
There will be NO Increase in VAT but a few areas are being looked at where we believe conspicuous consumption can be curtailed by specific tax measures and make a worthwhile contribution to improving the fiscal situation.
However, we are moving forward post-haste with the establishment of the Central Revenue Authority which will bring huge savings and efficiency gains in our tax collection and revenue management processes.
Our Renewable Energy programme is really ‘heating’ up with many private sector players following government’s lead of switching to renewable energy sources. Government will soon be investing about $1 billion in this area involving a new sugar cane factory and a WTE plant along with electricity generation using waver energy technology borrowed from Japan.
The necessary legislation to facilitate the RE revolution will soon be before Cabinet and then taken to Parliament for swift ratification along with the Cultural Industries Bill and FOI.
The ten point plan to revive tourism has been put in train along with the restructuring of the BTA to reposition Barbados and capitalize on new emerging markets.
The Cruise Ship terminal with the help of Bannister of SMI Solutions that assisted with the BOLT arrangement for the $700 million Dodds Prisons will soon be started along with the Pierhead marina.
We are also looking at this model of financing for the new hospital earmarked for Kingsland.
Despite the fiscal challenges this government’s housing programme is still on track and it is expected that all of our empty units will be occupied by year-end with that massive project at the Grotto earmarked to be fully occupied by end of 2014.
We wish the Minister for once would level with the people and save what little credibility is left in this man’s character.
first comment out the bag is a “BEGGAR”
First caller is Mr. P – a known DLPite – he questioned the credibility of the MoF and government, example BLP promised 90 million stimulus ad the government has backraised with a 600 million.
I heard some people laughing out loud at the DLP this morning because of this piece of news on the below link, but i really cannot laugh…..let’s hear the yardfowls now.
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The MoF has rebutted Mr. P by suggesting that the BLP proposed a tax stimulus which if costed independently can be estimated at 300 million. What he has neglected to say is that the BLP indicated that tax concessions would stimulate consumer send and therefore support government tax revenue base.
A revelation by the MoF is that the financing company for the Cruise Ship Terminal projects has been refused a sovereign guarantee. The proposal has to be ‘rejig’ the proposal.
Bu, do you know if the MOF was invited by VOB today? This is kind of unusual.
The MoF has stated that sending home of public workers is not a FIRST option. If the time comes to cut expenditure in a more urgent manner the government will discuss with the unions and other stakeholders.
I do not think that public workers are in any way more comfortable than before the MOF statement just now. My cousin is a temporary teacher for the last 5 years and is accustom getting his contract for the next academic year all like now so. To date when he checked with the secretary/treasurer of the particular school, no directive has come from the Education ministry to release those contracts. So don’t mind Stinkliar. He is trying his best to be so polite. I do not know how long he can maintain that.
Why not give the people who stealing from farmers lands to work and all the other supports needed?
MOF says no more tinkering, impossible within current structure.
The MoF says the MTFS met targets initially. Agree? How do we factor borrowings from the NIS.
VOB, please put a competent panel together for tomorrow’s brasstacks to discuss what the MOF said today.
The NUPW should be concerned that the MoF says the government is moving ahead with the Barbados Revenue Collection Agency. Implied is that jobs may be going? In fact he hinted that government may have some issues with the unions.
No BU, do not be too concerned about those workers. They should have seen the danger coming, that is, NUPW and Dennis Clarke done sell out the workers already. They should have jump ship a long time ago in their interest. When that time comes when they the workers will be repalced, NUPW will NOT do one thing for them. Mark my word.
For now, I will take my chances with the BWU. right now (Sir Roy) , he is holding strain down in the port against Maloney and at the water authority.
This issue with the BWA and the laying of pipes which has caused additional cost to be added to pipe laying projects and mobilization of loans should be of concern. Caswell do you have any views.
The issue of buying Almond and handover to a management company is good in theory. However let us examine Hilton under a similar arrangement. It is a loss making arrangement at the moment.
Good news from the MoF about Four Seasons and security of NIS funds committed to the project.
I do not take anything Stinkliar says as gospel. All of what he is saying is just the calm before the storm, just public relations and wasting valuable air time. I need to know how is the 400million cut in expenditure is going to be achieved and how it will affect me and my family..
No Actuarial Study for the NIS forthcoming. Minister this is not a joke.
When question about Ministers volunteering to take a hair cut the whole thing turned into a laughing matter … two PR people trying to come across as if they are serious. I am NO fan of Hoyos, but he would have done a far better job, a far more informed job of questioning a MoF … stupse. PR PR
He ain’ gun read my email … Stupse … talkin’ ’bout efficiency … TIME WASTING. Some questions always evoke the same response … what answer could Ellis possibly expect that would be any different to the stand response that he got. TIME WASTING.
The MoF will walk away from this setting smelling like a rose … Good job Ellis … PR PR PR
Agree with you BAFBFP. You could clearly see that the Minister did not even want to go in that direction. Mr. Ellis chuckled yes, but I don’t think he was being insensitive. He, Stinkliar and other government lackies would want the rest of us should bear the burden. Not fuh shiite. Bajans will have to stand up for their rights.
One wonders how forthcoming the MoF could have been without revealing what will be in the Black Box. Of interest was how he responded to the penultimate caller regarding what % of public sector emoluments will be touched by the 400 million cut.
Business per usual!
Now please tell us, this issue with the BWA and pipe laying has been a problem for several years. Why the hell with a touted social partnership we are now hearing that the PM will intervene? Where is the urgency?
Trevor Marshall is trying to be provocative with his comments about white people, I am sure of that.
Would hate to think that he is still rooted in a Barbados of his early years.
The MoF announced that he would soon be going to the international financial markets to borrow and how there are lenders queuing up begging Barbados to borrow.
What a laugh!
To lend what? Promises like those made to Al Barrack and CLICO policyholders?
If that is the case why depend on the Chinese to bail out the Almond Resort? Why rely on the Chinese with their all Chinese labour and materials lending stipulations for the Sugar Cane factory or the WTE plant?
This blasted idiot can’t even get the IDB to finance projects without serious fiscal cutback and economic structural adjustments far less private sector lenders in the international money markets whose principals and shareholders will demand exceedingly stringent lending conditions based on the assessment of international credit rating agencies.
Why are these same international lenders with loads of money not lining up to take over the Four Seasons Project? What about the Pierhead marina and Pickerings?
Just another roll of bullshit from this lying buffoon with which he would soon be splattered when the big shit hits the fan.
David Ellis is a very poor moderator when it comes to matters of an economic and financial nature. Even DJ would have done a better job. But if Pat Hoyos were invited we would have witnessed a replay of that much talked about (from what I heard) scenario between Adrian Loveridge and Noel lynch in the VOB studios.
There is no way Stinkliar would have subjected himself to the probing questions of the more informed Pat Hoyos.
@Miller……, David Ellis did his best. He did indeed pose questions that me, as a lay person thought about. My only problem with Ellis was that he gave Stinkliar too much time to beat around the bush when giving an explanation. By the time he finish answering the question, I did not remember what was asked.
I laugh so hard when Stinkliar said that investors were lining up to lend Barbados money. If that were so, how comes when he went way earlier this year to borrow money all over Europe, he came back empty handed. Stups…………e. Bull shit
It may well be that investors are queueing up to lend to Barbados, the question is at at what interest rate now we have had all the downgrades?
Someone will always lend if the balance of risk and return is right.
The overall percentage of the Government’s expenditure allocated to covering interest on loans will go up yet again, meaning there is even less to spend on other things, including any stimulus to get the economy going again.
I like Sinkler before he became a Minister in Government, I did. If it is his roll to be a bull shitter now that he is a Minister, he is doing a damned good job of it. To me it was up to the interviewer to find a way past the bull shit, and with Ellis across the table, Sinkler would be very comfortable in his role as bullshitters never seriously get involved with exposing other bullshitters.
Stinkliar did better than I thought. He tried his best not to grunt, bark, bite and growl, scream. Then again, today is Sunday the holy day and he would not want to offend the church people. Brrasstacks programme on a Sunday is a little less antagonistic.
International agencies are lining up to lend Barbados money, obviously, Stinkliar did not see the below article in the Nation today.
Not jolly
•
Pickering Court. (FP)
By MARIA BRADSHAW | Sun, July 28, 2013 – 12:10 AM
A CANADIAN businessman who invested US$750 000 in the Pickering Court Project, which is still to get off the ground in St Lucy, is seeking to have a lien placed on the 200 000 square feet of land because the developers have not repaid his money.
Speaking to the SUNDAY SUN from his office in Canada, businessman Denham Jolly calculated he was owed close to US$1 million (BDS$2 million) in interest and other fees on the loan.
Jolly said he was in contact with a local attorney to pursue a lawsuit against Pickering Court Development and North Ridge Development Company, in an effort to recover his money.
He revealed that in 2011 he was approached by Reynold Austin, the president of the Democratic Labour Party’s (DLP) Canadian branch, about advancing a loan to Pickering Court Development.
“I knew Mr Austin through a business association,” he explained. “He approached me in the spring of 2011 for a business loan for Pickering Court Development. He assured me that it was a great investment because it was a centrepiece for the Government and the enhancement of their re-election.”
The MoF complained about the rising interest debt on borrowings and contingent liabilities. So if we keep borrowing to shore up balance of payments what next?
What next indeed
If we listen to the minister we will have to wait until the budget to see where the cuts ‘land’. By the way, does anyone believe the heads to cut have not been already identified?
Putting plaster over a gaping wound.
They can’t get past August 13th. Mia will call for a divide on the Budget and one of two members of the DLP won’t support it or will be ill.
That’s what happens when you put a bullshitter to impersonate a Minister of Finance. VAT ain’t going up but Residential rent will now be subject to VAT.
Stupse. Clueless.
Interesting is that he left the door open to retrench workers.
@ Bag Juice | July 28, 2013 at 2:39 PM |
“.. David Ellis did his best. He did indeed pose questions that me, as a lay person thought about.”
He, David Ellis, did his best alright (given his insular journalistic experiences and exposure); putting aside his personal friendship with the man and his perceived reluctance to mash the toes of officials that might jeopardize his job or the Station’s advertising revenues.
He should have asked the more probing questions about the government’s need to cut $66 million from this year’s payroll while at the same time merging 4 separate revenue collection agencies into one Central Revenue Authority without the inevitable disappearance of existing jobs both temporary and permanent.
How is the Minister going to achieve such a magical feat? By wishing upon a star?
If you swallowed that bullshit about the Four Seasons and investors lining up to put money in Barbados you would swallow the promise that Bajans will never have to pay to go to the UWI as guaranteed by PM Stuart.
This bollocks talking guy Sinckler should be aware that there are bigger bullshitters than he out there. And you just can’t “out-bullshit” a smarter bullshitter.
Let this bullshitter show his crap by naming at least one international financier he held discussions with during his April jaunt to City of London and who expressed a solid interest in doing business with Barbados as it stands.
“Money talks, bullshit walks, that is how life goes”.
The behaviour of the MoF regarding his interpretation of the TFS is like a drunkard who buys rum, get drunk and expect to wake up the next day and all his troubles disappear. David, are we knowledgeable to the amount of monies that this Government keep borrowing without informing the public Were you aware of the $750,000.00 loan for the Pickering project? These short term window dressing is destroying investors confident.
Wuh kinda team this is a tall. Even when we out the opposition for a low score it becomes too many. WI cricket and politics – the same thing.
@TMW
Isn’t Pickering a private project?
Did Ellis read an email sent to BT and the MofF re: NIS Benefits v. US Social Security?
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