OPPOSITION Member of Parliament Cynthia Forde dodged giving a direct response to the ten per cent tax on sweetened drinks and juices which was proposed in the 2015 Financial Statement and Budgetary Proposals, but she firmly supports healthy eating.
Amidst cheering supporters dressed in red outside the gates of Parliament Tuesday, she said, “I am not going to discuss that [the 10% tax]. I believe Barbadians should eat and drink healthy. The kind of money that people would take up to buy soft drinks, if you want to call it that, they can buy a few limes and make lemonade and it would not cost as much.”
She added that she supports any effort to help people live longer, healthier lives.
The ten per cent tax was imposed by Minister of Finance Chris Sinckler during his Budgetary Proposals on Monday.
Forde, the representative for St Thomas, said that the Barbados Labour Party’s motto is to represent the people. She said the budget would further bury poor people and pull middle class people even lower.
“Because of the astronomical efforts of this government to destroy an economy, the government is building a society and not an economy; they destroyed both.”
There was also mixed reaction to the 2015 budget by some of the spectators, with one person saying they were not bothered by it.
One female onlooker outside the gates of Parliament said “Soon from now you cannot buy nothing when you go into the supermarket because the food gone up. So when food gone up you cannot eat properly. I think all the taxes bothering all Barbadians.”
In contrast, a male Rastafarian who did not want to be identified said, “There is nothing that they are doing that humbugging me. I never hungry yet, I never bruk and I do not spend outside my means. Whatever the Government does you have to live with it, you cannot change it. It makes no sense fussing.” (SB/TG/RB)
