OPPOSITION spokesman on finance, planning and the public sector Julian Robinson has blasted the Andrew Holness Administration for what he claims is its attempt to erase the history of the People’s National Party (PNP) in plotting the macroeconomic stability the country now enjoys.

“It was under the last PNP Administration that the heavy lifting was done to secure the macroeconomic foundation that exists today. They would have us believe that they single-handedly fixed the economy — as if history started in 2016,” said Robinson as he made his contribution to the 2025/26 Budget Debate in Parliament on Thursday.

In responding to what he described as a history lesson presented by Finance Minister Fayval Williams in her opening presentation in the Budget Debate on Tuesday, Robinson said that he needed to remind the Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) Administration that the economic foundation they now stand on was built by the superior economic management of the PNP.

According to Robinson, without the work of the PNP Administration between 2012 and 2016, the country’s economic fundamentals would still be in a perilous state.

He told the House that now that the macroeconomic fundamentals are bearing fruit and the returns on the structural and tax reforms the PNP implemented are leading to higher revenues, suddenly the Holness Administration wants to claim paternity.

“They cannot claim paternity for fixing the economy. If they try to claim paternity we would call it a jacket, and if you did the DNA…the DNA would say, ‘a nuh fi dem pickney, a PNP pickney,” trumpeted Robinson to applause from the members on his side of the chamber.

The Opposition spokesman charged that the current Government wants people to forget that it was the PNP Administration from 2012 to 2016 that saved the economy and restored domestic and international confidence in Jamaica’s credibility as a nation.

“We recall the years that the economy experienced 14 consecutive quarters of negative growth, from 2007 to 2010, only to achieve a mere 1.51 per cent in 2011. So I was just surprised that the history lesson did not go back as far on Tuesday, it conveniently stopped,” said Robinson.

He charged that under the JLP Administration of 2007 to 2011, Jamaica’s economic situation could be described as dire, notwithstanding the global financial crisis.

Robinson noted that JLP Government introduced the Fiscal Responsibility Framework and rolled out the Jamaica Debt Exchange which the International Monetary Fund (IMF) required the country to do but argued that these did not solve the problem.

He told the House that in 2011 the JLP abandoned and effectively ended the 27-month Stand-By Arrangement with the IMF and did not fail an IMF test but instead did not take one.

Robinson quoted from a then senior IMF official who accused the JLP Administration of abandoning the programme without any indication or consultation with the fund.

According to Robinson, the collapse of the IMF programme strained relations with the fund and other multilateral organisations which withheld their support from Jamaica in 2011.

“The international financial community turned its back on us, complicating our ability to meet the IMF’s strict requirements and contributing to significant macroeconomic instability.

“By 2012 we were on the precipice of an economic collapse, with no access to the international capital markets and public debt soaring to an unprecedented 134 per cent of GDP — our very survival as a nation was at stake,” said Robinson.

The Opposition spokesman said having been handed the reins of power by the Jamaican people, the PNP managed to renegotiate a new IMF agreement with the support of international allies, which provided a financial lifeline for Jamaica.

“Make no mistake about it; it was a painful negotiation. The IMF felt that we had to be taught a lesson because the level of trust had broken down,” said Robinson.

“It was [Prime Minister] Portia Simpson Miller who used her international political capital to get our friends in the Black Caucus in [the United States] Congress to lobby the IMF so that we could renegotiate an agreement.

“Congresswoman Maxine Waters led a delegation to the IMF…and pleaded the case of Jamaica,” added Robinson.

He told the House that during its tenure the PNP had to undertake difficult reforms and, “some of those measures were painful”.

The Opposition spokesman admitted that the PNP raised taxes and ran a large fiscal surplus, but argued that it was this discipline by the Simpson Miller Administration that handed the JLP the economy it now enjoys.

“By the time we left office, we had reduced public debt to approximately 120 per cent of GDP. We upheld an unparalleled level of fiscal discipline, tightened fiscal policies, and rolled out a comprehensive economic reform programme.

“The programme focused on structural reforms to stimulate growth and employment, significant fiscal adjustments backed by broad institutional reforms,” said Robinson.

He pointed out that in July 2015, Jamaica under the PNP raised US$2 billion on the international capital markets at the lowest rates ever.

“A third of those funds were used to buy back outstanding debt, including a portion of the PetroCaribe debt from Venezuela and that transaction… ultimately saved Jamaica over US$300 million in debt service. It reduced Jamaica’s debt-to-GDP ratio by over 10 per cent,” said Robinson.

“We birthed economic stability after the JLP’s botched attempt at it in 2009; we are committed to it in 2025 and will ensure that we entrench it so that no Government can play with something as important as this,” said Robinson.