POINTE BLANCHE–The country’s budget should be a collection of the present needs of the people. It should be sensitive to the conditions of the people. As such, buying new cars for ministers among other things “is just insensitive to the reality of what this island is going through. First fix the people’s homes and create job for a sustainable country,” according to Theo Heyliger, suspended Member of Parliament.
In a hand written statement, Heyliger said after natural disasters, budgets should reflect: policies and monies available for rebuilding, incentives to stabilize and grow the economy, creation and securing of jobs, buying land to build affordable hurricane-resistant homes and schools, building infrastructure to withstand natural disasters, and answers to what is happening with our closed hotels and what is being done to open them.
A budget, he writes, should have polices to increase the allowable tax deduction on maintenance of one’s home. This can go a long way in repairing our homes to withstand hurricanes and to increase the allowable tax deductions on insurance should also be done as insurance premiums have gone up.
Heyliger, who was the highest vote-getter in the last Parliamentary election and the only MP to have earned his seat outright, writes that eliminating or reducing the taxes on overtime especially for law enforcement of the country.
“If the government has to now pay for the Dutch Police then why are we not investing in our own police? Government must make sure that our police get the same pay and benefits as the Dutch Police if it is paying for it or it then becomes prejudiced against own people. Investment in recruiting law enforcement personnel locally should be a priority rather than paying for temporary relief,” Heyliger writes.
He added that buying land to build homes and making the same development agreement with the General Pension Find APS to build on “is a perfect example of encouraging our people to own their own home.”
Heyliger reminds Parliament and government in his statement: “No politician got up on any stage and promised to buy themselves new cars when elected. How does the budget reflect the governing programme? Prepare a budget that moves our people forward.”
Heyliger is currently in detained in Pointe Blanche prison on charges levied by the prosecutor’s office and has been suspended from Parliament due to these accusations.
Source: The Daily Herald https://www.thedailyherald.sx/islands/87330-theo-to-govt-fix-people-s-homes-and-create-jobs-not-buy-new-cars
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