Prime Minister Andrew Holness is standing firm to his commitment of increasing the income tax threshold next April, and says that the funds earmarked for the tax break will not be diverted to fighting crime.

“I have already made the public commitment that there will be an increased allocation in crime fighting. You have already seen published in the Economic Growth Council a set of actions.

“Just today [Thursday] the Ministry of National Security working in tandem with the Attorney General’s Office has essentially completed a new legal framework to assist in crime fighting. So there will be an allocation, it will not necessarily interfere with programmes that are already agreed on, but there has to be an increased allocation,” Holness said.

The statement was in response to suggestions by the co-chair of the Economic Programme Oversight Committee (EPOC), Richard Byles, to “delay or stretch out” the increase in income tax threshold next April in an effort to place more resources into fighting crime across the country.

“We can’t fight crime with just sentiments and words — we have to put our resources where the problem is,” Holness continued. He was speaking at the joint Government of Jamaica and International Monetary Fund press conference at the Office of the Prime Minister in Kingston last Thursday.

Last week, Byles suggested that about half of the $16 billion the Government expects to raise to finance the second phase of the increase in income tax threshold plan could be routed to capital expenditure for the security forces.

He noted that the newly formed Economic Growth Council has cited crime as one of — the greatest impediments to growth in Jamaica, and that the Security Ministry could see a tripling in capital budget if the Government routed $8 billion from the tax break to fighting crime.

“We have scarce resources; we are going to raise $16 billion next year to increase the tax threshold? Is that the best way to spend the scarce resources or should we be putting some of it into fighting crime?” he questioned as he addressed journalists at the monthly EPOC press briefing at Sagicor’s head office in New Kingston.

He added that public documents showed insufficient resources with total capital expenditure of the Government at $43 billion and total capital expenditure for the national security ministry of $3.6 billion.

“I’m glad that there is a mind share developing in the country, but the obvious answer is that resources have to be allocated to the priority of fighting crime. We agree on that. There are other priorities as well, such as economic growth and the transformation of the tax system because all things working together will actually result in a reduction in crime,” Holness said.