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Don Wehby, Minister without Portfolio in the Finance Ministry, has personally committed to reining in public spending, saying in his first interview about his new job that the finance team was determined to achieve macroeconomic stability through disciplined focus on the country's fiscal affairs.
He also signalled that, from a policy perspective, the government hopes to flatten interest rates, saying that the current 14 per cent was trending on the high side and not expected to rise further.
"My number one priority is the issue of fiscal discipline. I will personally be focusing immediately on the issue of public expenditure. A critical part of this focus on public expenditure is the whole issue of the budgeting process, to which I intend to pay very close attention," said Wehby.
Room for improvement
"As part of this process, we will put in place the appropriate checks and balances. There is lot of room for improvement. I believe that just reforming the budget process alone can save the country millions of dollars."
Responding specifically to what this means in practice, he noted that the Ministry of Finance is now examining possible ways to strengthen the existing Budget Information System, particularly on the expenditure side.
For example, he said, this means ensuring that all budgets developed by the various ministries, depart-ments and agencies (MDAs) are realistic estimations of what they need to spend to successfully carry out their mandate during a given fiscal year.
In the past, because of the lack of realism of their budgets, ministries often returned to the Finance for additional funds, so that the final expenditure frequently bore little relationship to their targets.
Wehby also noted that Finance was also exploring cuts in unnecessary expenditure by the various MDAs that form part of the public service, but said this issue was being approached with much sensitivity.
As part of this exercise, the minister is researching the applicability of such innovations as zero base budgeting - effectively starting the budgetary process from scratch - as opposed to just adding a percentage to what was the previous year's budget.
Admitting the current fiscal position was "challenging", Wehby said he was not willing to go beyond Minister Audley Shaw's parliamentary speech Tuesday (see that story on Pages 8&9) in terms of quantifying the problem, merely advising that they were currently doing an assessment of the whole fiscal situation.
"We will advise the country shortly," he said.
However, he followed up by stressing that fiscal targets once set must be met.
"This cannot be an issue for debate."
It's the type of tone and stance that private sector interests are likely to applaud. Company bosses and business trade associations have long complained that the system is choked with wasteful spending.
Wehby says it is possible that the current fiscal overrun could be reduced by year-end March 2008 through tighter fiscal management, but did not specify the true size of the problem.
"We are working on the solutions," he said.
He also signalled that, from a policy perspective, the government hopes to flatten interest rates, saying that the current 14 per cent was trending on the high side and not expected to rise further.
"My number one priority is the issue of fiscal discipline. I will personally be focusing immediately on the issue of public expenditure. A critical part of this focus on public expenditure is the whole issue of the budgeting process, to which I intend to pay very close attention," said Wehby.
Room for improvement
"As part of this process, we will put in place the appropriate checks and balances. There is lot of room for improvement. I believe that just reforming the budget process alone can save the country millions of dollars."
Responding specifically to what this means in practice, he noted that the Ministry of Finance is now examining possible ways to strengthen the existing Budget Information System, particularly on the expenditure side.
For example, he said, this means ensuring that all budgets developed by the various ministries, depart-ments and agencies (MDAs) are realistic estimations of what they need to spend to successfully carry out their mandate during a given fiscal year.
In the past, because of the lack of realism of their budgets, ministries often returned to the Finance for additional funds, so that the final expenditure frequently bore little relationship to their targets.
Wehby also noted that Finance was also exploring cuts in unnecessary expenditure by the various MDAs that form part of the public service, but said this issue was being approached with much sensitivity.
As part of this exercise, the minister is researching the applicability of such innovations as zero base budgeting - effectively starting the budgetary process from scratch - as opposed to just adding a percentage to what was the previous year's budget.
Admitting the current fiscal position was "challenging", Wehby said he was not willing to go beyond Minister Audley Shaw's parliamentary speech Tuesday (see that story on Pages 8&9) in terms of quantifying the problem, merely advising that they were currently doing an assessment of the whole fiscal situation.
"We will advise the country shortly," he said.
However, he followed up by stressing that fiscal targets once set must be met.
"This cannot be an issue for debate."
It's the type of tone and stance that private sector interests are likely to applaud. Company bosses and business trade associations have long complained that the system is choked with wasteful spending.
Wehby says it is possible that the current fiscal overrun could be reduced by year-end March 2008 through tighter fiscal management, but did not specify the true size of the problem.
"We are working on the solutions," he said.
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