AS MUCH AS WE DO NOT CHERISH the idea of cuts in social services, it seems Government, for the time being, is offered no other choice than to restrain spending on social programmes. This cannot be the only strategy since the least well off cannot be expected, singly, to bear the burden of reform.
In similar veins it is of equal importance that free spending by statutory boards must be arrested if the aggregate of transfers is to be brought under control.
It is clear that entities such as the Barbados Transport Board, National Housing Corporation, Queen Elizabeth Hospital, Urban Development Corporation, Barbados Water Authority and the National Drug Service require close examination to bring under control expenditure that has skyrocketed. It is known within the National Drug Service there is severe wastage and duplication. Close scrutiny would disclose wastage, leakages, indiscipline, unaccountability and poor administrative functions have contributed to higher demands on the public purse than should be necessary.
For years now and with monotonous repetition the Auditor General has highlighted poor initiatives, waste, non-collection of revenue, duplicate payments, overpayments, ordering of inventory way in excess of known requirements as causes of higher costs and to one’s best knowledge guilty persons have not answered for these discrepancies.
We next turn to productivity which is widely known to be abysmal. How is it that both Lime and Barbados Light & Power Limited have been able to put out one and two-man crews to undertake maintenance and effect repairs to equipment while the Barbados Water Authority often carries not less than six persons as crew?
With regard to tax reform, we are fully aware of the considerable sums owed to Inland Revenue, VAT, Land Tax, Licenses including road tax and National Insurance. This situation speaks to poor collection procedures, lack of enforcement, absence of enforced penalties for late and/or non payment and in the case of traffic impositions a profound disregard for the consequences of non payment due to a less than efficient record keeping regime.
All the above should have been planks in the application of Public Sector Reform. Alas this initiative, after two decades, can hardly be described as having been nearly successful. Although unlicensed, as many as thirty thousand vehicles are said to be on our roads, says it all.
This infringement coupled with the failure to carry appropriate insurance coverage puts other users of the roads at risk and exposes Government to unbudgeted expenditure in the event an accident resulting in injury to occupants, pedestrians or third party property occurs.
With computer capability widely available it is unclear why revenue systems are not more efficient.
