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Carl Gilchrist, Gleaner Writer Defending the Government's decision to cut the education budget, Education Minister Andrew Holness yesterday labelled criticisms levelled by the president of a United States-based body as "unfair".
Dennis Van Roekel, presi-dent of the National Education Association, in addressing the 46th annual conference of the Jamaica Teachers' Association on Monday, said he had written to the US State Department seeking support for a bill limiting lending by the International Monetary Fund to countries that make cuts in their education budgets.
Yesterday, during his own address on the final day of the conference at the Sunset Jamaica Grande in Ocho Rios, St Ann, Holness hit back by noting that some states in the US had made cuts in their education budgets as a result of the recession.
Slight decline
Responding directly to Van Roekel's comments, Holness explained that the cut in Jamaica's education budget, which he said was less than two per cent, was brought about because of Government's one-time payout of $4 billion to the island's teachers.
"So, yes, there was a slight decline, but if you were to take out that one-time payment - in real terms. That is, if you were to deflate the budget - we would be flat," he argued.
Holness said the cut resulted from a new paradigm in the island's fiscal accounting.
"We set upfront, binding expenditure and borrowing constraints, so if we set that we are going to borrow X-billions this year, the only way we can borrow more is unless there are extremely extenuating circum-stances, such as a severe natural disaster," he said.
"Outside of that, our borrowing, our spending and therefore our deficit, is fixed, and it is not just fixed by virtue of agreement. It is fixed now by law because we passed a new piece of legislation ... so there is no increase that can happen outside of what is set."
http://jamaica-gleaner.com/gleaner/2...ead/lead7.html
Dennis Van Roekel, presi-dent of the National Education Association, in addressing the 46th annual conference of the Jamaica Teachers' Association on Monday, said he had written to the US State Department seeking support for a bill limiting lending by the International Monetary Fund to countries that make cuts in their education budgets.
Yesterday, during his own address on the final day of the conference at the Sunset Jamaica Grande in Ocho Rios, St Ann, Holness hit back by noting that some states in the US had made cuts in their education budgets as a result of the recession.
Slight decline
Responding directly to Van Roekel's comments, Holness explained that the cut in Jamaica's education budget, which he said was less than two per cent, was brought about because of Government's one-time payout of $4 billion to the island's teachers.
"So, yes, there was a slight decline, but if you were to take out that one-time payment - in real terms. That is, if you were to deflate the budget - we would be flat," he argued.
Holness said the cut resulted from a new paradigm in the island's fiscal accounting.
"We set upfront, binding expenditure and borrowing constraints, so if we set that we are going to borrow X-billions this year, the only way we can borrow more is unless there are extremely extenuating circum-stances, such as a severe natural disaster," he said.
"Outside of that, our borrowing, our spending and therefore our deficit, is fixed, and it is not just fixed by virtue of agreement. It is fixed now by law because we passed a new piece of legislation ... so there is no increase that can happen outside of what is set."
http://jamaica-gleaner.com/gleaner/2...ead/lead7.html
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