Second District Representative J. Alvin Christopher (left) and Former Finance Minister Ronnie W. Skelton differed on the issue of spending money from the Consultation funds after the budget is passed, without the approval of the House of Assembly with Hon. Christopher saying the HOA is not a rubber stamp for Cabinet.

The VI Constitution and the Finance Management Act give the Minister of Finance power to withdraw money from the Consolidated Fund for whatever was required when there was insufficient funds, however, once it gets to a certain lever it must return to the HOA to be regularized.

Mr. Smith explained to the Committee appointed by the HOA to examine the 2012 draft budget estimates that there were provisions in the Act that allowed advances to be made, “so one could say that those were made under those provisions”.

The fifth term Member of Parliament told the FS during the deliberations that “only the House of Assembly had the authority to withdraw $51 million from the Consolidated Fund.”

Honourable Christopher further stated that “the House of Assembly was not a rubber stamp for the Cabinet, and this practice needed to be discontinued.”

The second district representative emphatically stated that he would not be supporting such decisions anymore.

Meanwhile, speaking on the matter at this year’s SFC meetin, former Minister for Finance and current Minister for Health and Social Development Ronnie W. Skelton referred the body to section 103 of the Constitution that gave the Minister for Finance the authority to withdraw money from the Consolidated Fund for whatever was required when there were insufficient funds.

Minister Skelton further informed the SFC that the Finance Management Act contained a provision to issue advances for up to one and a half percent of the current year’s budget; but once it got to that level, it needed to be brought before the House and regularized.

However, the second district representative was not convinced and fired back saying that one and a half percent of $280 million could not equate to $51 million.

Honourable Christopher felt that it would do justice to the House to retract all previous statements that had been made in the House regarding running deficits and stated that it “was un-authorized expenditure.”

The Member for the third district Honourable Julian Fraser RA, noted that $500,000 had been appropriated under Natural Disaster Management-Infrastructure Rehabilitation and asked for more details.

The FS stated that, in the event the loan commenced this year, we would only be making interest payments. The former Minister for Communications and Works Fraser wondered whether the placement of $15 million in the reserves would make us compliant with the borrowing guidelines.

To this the FS Mr. Smith said yes plus having cash balances of approximately $65 million. He added that it also involved projections that had been made and the type of existing projects.