by Ministry of Finance and Economic Affairs

Minister of Finance and Economic Affairs, Christopher Sinckler. (FP)

Minister of Finance and Economic Affairs, Christopher Sinckler. (FP)

Mr. Speaker, I crave the indulgence of this Honourable Chamber to present this year’s Financial Statement and Budgetary Proposals.

I do so Sir mindful of the important responsibility which has been entrusted to your Government to develop policies and craft strategies, both economic and social, to assist with the orderly, holistic and expansive development of this beautiful island of ours.

It is not a responsibility which my colleagues and I take lightly as we are acutely aware that in very many instances the current and even future success of possibly every life in Barbados will be affected in some way by the decisions we take.

In this regard, the first objective of this exercise, as is the case with all other discharges of public service, is to ensure that we do what is in the interest of the masses of people of Barbados and indeed of the country as a whole. This is the case Sir, even when among segments of those masses, sectors, or even institutions, there is not unanimous acclamation of some of the policies we implement.

Our mandate is simply to set an agenda and institute policies that see after the collective good and that are in the overall best interest of the country. And like any other maturing democracy we have and do expect support for, as well as opposition to, any policy or set of measures which we present and pursue.

That is a fundamental part of the democratic process. So as we gather here this week to once again execute a critical intervention in the economic management of the country, I have little doubt that the same experiences will be relived. My hope of course is that this will be done with the highest levels of seriousness, decorum and respect for the canons and conventions of responsible debate in this august Chamber.

The full Financial Statement and Budgetary Proposals may be downloaded [media-downloader media_id=”18718″ texts=”here”] while the Summary of Budgetary Measures may be downloaded [media-downloader media_id=”18717″ texts=”here”].

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