By Gaulbert Sutherland
A motion on the impact of global food prices in the name of Agriculture Minister Robert Persaud was approved on Tuesday after exhaustive debate and the matter will be further addressed by a parliament committee.
The PNCR-1G however dissented saying that the government’s track record of fulfilling commitments gives no assurance that, even if there is a plan, it will be implemented. The view was transmitted by leader of the People’s National Congress/Reform (PNCR), Robert Corbin said as he signalled that his party would not support the motion on the rising cost of food.
The motion was however passed by the National Assembly with an amendment committing it to a Special Select Committee to follow the implementation of government interventions and for the multi-stakeholder forum to deliberate on the issue at an appropriate time.
Corbin, stating that the party would not support the motion in that form, declared that it was meaningless in the absence of a concrete programme by the government to address the issue. Persaud, who tabled the motion, last month, said that some of the proposals from the opposite side warrant consideration.
The motion, debated on two days, was passed following hours of debate that rang with constant references to “28 years” and “16 years” and what had been done and not done. Amidst lengthy individual presentations, in his brief contribution to the debate, leader of the Alliance for Change (AFC), Raphael Trotman commended the government for its interventions, while arguing that far more can be done and called for all to work together. He called for a conscious review of the Value Added Tax (VAT) and its effects on Guyana.
Similar calls by members of the opposition benches for a reduction in the VAT rate were shot down by Finance Minister, Dr. Ashni Singh, who said that this could not be discussed without taking into consideration the entire fiscal operation of the government. Pointing to the increase in the income tax threshold, the increase in pension among others he asked “how is that being financed”, while declaring that VAT is providing a critical service to the country. He argued that it was less than responsible to seek to ignore the entire fiscal operation of the government and questioned what a reduction would do to revenue.
The Finance Minister further argued that nothing has been established to suggest that a reduction in the VAT rate would somehow reduce the cost of living. He used the example that a person earning the minimum wage would spend on four main areas namely, housing/rent, transportation, electricity and food most of which were zero-rated or the inputs zero-rated. “One could scarcely suggest that the cost of living could in any way be alleviated by the reduction of the VAT”, he declared.
He further asserted that the measures taken by the government to combat the rising cost of living can be described as comprehensive.
Corbin meanwhile, said that the government had failed to come up with a sufficiently imaginative programme to combat the crisis and the motion was meaningless in the absence of this. “What can the people of Guyana expect tomorrow in terms of concrete steps”, he asked. He stated that there was nothing wrong with the VAT but the party’s position was how it was implemented and the rate.
He criticized government MP’s for constantly referring to the years when the PNC was in power. “When you driving a car and looking back, you crash and this is what is happening to the government”, he charged. He declared that if the government was serious about growing more food, a policy should have been presented.
Meanwhile, in responding to an issue of consultations, which was raised by the opposition speakers, Minister Persaud said that there had been countrywide consultations and the President himself had met with members of the private sector, trade unions and others. He declared that the government has a comprehensive program for diversification and noted that exports have been increasing every year. He asserted that production and exports have gone up by close to 40%.
Minister of Social Services, Priya Manickchand, in supporting the motion, stated that government had made several interventions over the years pointing to the increase in pensions and public assistance. She asserted that government had foreseen the rising prices and took action pointing to cash transfers to 6% of the population. In any country, she said, “6% of the population receiving benefits is good”.
The motion was passed with several amendments tabled by Persaud. The motion commits that the National Assembly be provided with the deliberations of the Inter-Ministerial Commit-tee on Food Prices and the Special Select Committee on a quarterly basis to review the impact of rising food prices on Guyanese and make recommendations intended to cushion the impact. It also commits that the multi-stakeholder forum should deliberate on the issue “at an appropriate time”.
