KINGSTON, Jamaica — Prime Minister Andrew Holness will make his contribution to the 2022/2023 Budget Debate when the House of Representatives resumes at Gordon House at 2:00pm Thursday.

Following the Minister of Finance and the Public Service, Dr Nigel Clarke’s opening presentation on March 8, which focused on monetary and fiscal issues, the Prime Minister is expected to address economic and social issues, including crime, housing, agriculture, education, job creation, tourism and the COVID-19 pandemic.

Holness is expected to recall his government’s responses to the pandemic and the threat it still maintains to the economy, and possibly new directions in terms of the reducing of the protocols which were necessary to protect the country’s health.

Following upon the Prime Minister’s indication that “argument done”, speculation is that new protocols are to be listed, which will make it easier for a return to normal activities, and hopefully increase the level of post-COVID employment, especially in the tourism and construction sectors, and which are also likely to improve the quality of education, as well as widening the capacity for the resumption of normality in the sports and cultural sectors.

Following the presentation, the budget debate will be closed by Dr Clarke next Tuesday, March 22, when it is anticipated that he will respond to many of the pressing issues raised about the economy and the social infrastructure in the presentations from Opposition Leader Mark Golding and his party’s spokesman on finance, Julian Robinson  on March 10 and 15, respectively.

The Government is proposing to spend a total of $912 billion for the 2022/23 fiscal year. This is comprised of non-debt recurrent expenditure of $539.5 billion; capital expenditure of $65.1 billion; and debt servicing of $307.5 billion.

It represents a 0.2 percentage point increase, as a percentage of gross domestic product(GDP), including debt service increases by 3.3 per cent over fiscal year 2021/22, and include non-debt recurrent expenditures as well as provisions for the implementation of the competitive compensation restructure for public servants.

-Balford Henry