Mar 2009 Financial News

New budget on April 7 - PM

Mar 06, 2009

The 2009-2010 national Budget is to be tabled in the House of Representatives on Tuesday, April 7, says Prime Minister Bruce Golding.

The prime minister was speaking Wednesday night during his monthly call-in programme, 'Jamaica House Live', where he said, this year, parliamentarians are to be given sufficient time to review the document.

"The standing finance committee will consider the Budget the following week. Normally, the Budget is laid on a Thursday and the standing finance committee goes to work on it the following Tuesday," he said.

However, the prime minister said this year things would be done differently.

"This year we will be laying it from Tuesday the seventh (of April) so we will be giving parliamentarians one whole week to go through the budget to prepare themselves for, hopefully, intelligent, enlightened deliberations that this particular budget is going to require," Golding said.

Finance Minister Audley Shaw is slated to open the Budget debate on April 23. Last year, the Government tabled a $489.5-billion net budget. This fiscal year is expected to be a challenging one for the country due primarily to the global economic downturn.


Source:
Jamaica Gleaner
Friday March 6, 2009

http://www.jamaica-gleaner.com/gleaner/20090306/business/business2.html