'Economy not booming!’ – Hon Christopher
“The Premier gave the impression that the economy was booming again, but the reaction that I am seeing on the street is not saying that,” said Hon Christopher in a comment to this news site yesterday November 18, 2014.
Premier Smith presented his budget for 2015 during the Second Sitting of the Fourth Session of the Second House of Assembly on Monday November 17, 2014.
“He was talking about the major contracts that he was going to do at the cruise ship dock and the sewerage project in Road Town,” Hon Christopher said.
“Quite a bit of money is being spent on those projects but one will realize those major projects only employ a certain amount of people and that doesn’t really get money into the economy and into circulation in a quick time,” he said.
“Petty contracts do, but it seems as this administration has abandoned the petty contracts system. Now the petty contract system is a very good system but probably in the past it had been misused. But that is no reason to abandon it. You have to find what the problem is and try to correct it,” Hon Christopher said.
He said that the petty contracts help to get money into circulation. “I have served as a Minister for 12 years and in my experience in the past is that one of the things you find is that the private sector looks to government as an indicator to see what government is doing after they present the budget and their proposals,” he said.
“So if there is no money out there that government is putting out the private sector remains shut down and regardless of how many millions you spend [on large projects by companies from outside the Territory] that money doesn’t have any impact on your local economy and these are the things we have been trying to tell Dr Smith for the last two years,” he said.
“I don’t believe in the spend, spend attitude…I believe in spending but spending in cases where it is important to spend and get the economy [kick started] so that the private sector can kick in. What is happening right now is that the private sector is very quiet because government isn’t showing any indication where money is going to be out there to support them. Government has to be the one to show the way,” he said.
According to Hon Christopher, at the same time the Premier was saying that the economy was good during his budget speech, about four persons attempted to break and enter people’s properties which according to Hon Christopher was verified by Police.
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15 Responses to “'Economy not booming!’ – Hon Christopher”
As a leader Christopher should tell us how he intends to make it better.
I don't like to hear politicians talking without substance and Christopher, and a few others have that trend.