Mia: Help Govt

Spending cuts are definitely imminent and Prime Minister Mia Mottley wants Barbadians to tell Government what it should cull.

Mottley announced last evening that having started consultations with the Social Partnership on Friday, her administration would this week engage the public in electronic polling to help determine where it should trim expenditure.

And she made it clear the action was not dictated by the International Monetary Fund (IMF), but because Barbados’ “gas tank [is] empty”.

In a nationally-televised 90-minute interview with veteran journalist David Ellis, Mottley also defended the size of her Cabinet and the hiring of several special advisors at a time when money is scarce.

The Prime Minister said the spending cuts, which she wanted to make progress on within the next four to six weeks, would focus on expenditure at 60 statutory corporations and some Government departments, but she stressed people would not be “thrown overboard”. (SC)

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