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"content": "Mr. Speaker, Sir, I do not accept the statement by some of the hon. Members who have 1414 PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES June 25, 2008 contributed here; that this is a Procedural Motion! It is not a Procedural Motion! Probably, it has been treated as one in the past. We come here and, as a matter of ritual, we are presented with half of the Printed Estimates. We pass them and say: \"The Government can now go ahead and spend the money.\" That is not how it should be done. In fact, there is a very serious omission on the part of the Minister for Finance, both during his submission of the Budget Speech and thereafter. He has never taken any trouble to explain to this House the actual implementation progress of the Budget. We know, as a matter of fact, that in every quarter, the Minister for Finance is supposed to present to the House an implementation plan to show how the money has been spent. That way, we can know how much money has been approved and how much has actually been spent. Mr. Speaker, Sir, what he should have started with today, is to come to this House and say: \"This is what has happened in the past. Last year, we passed a Vote on Account where 60 per cent was approved and, in actual fact, before the Appropriation Act was approved, this is what happened.\" What he has come up with here is a very simplistic and, actually, a very lazy way of doing business. He has come up with a linear extrapolation of a full Budget and divided it by two for all the Ministries. Not very much thought has gone into this thing. What the Minister ought to have done is to analyze every Ministry. That is because Ministries do not spend money uniformly. That is a fact! So, merely to give approval for 50 per cent for each Ministry is actually like giving a blank cheque. The Minister should have done some homework and actually come up and said: \"Some Ministries may require even 70 per cent. Others may require 20 per cent. Others will require 10 per cent.\" He should do it on a Ministry-by-Ministry basis. But to come here and give us 50 per cent across the board is a lazy and easy way of putting it; and trying to take advantage of a Constitutional provision. In fact, the Constitutional provision is very clear. It says that before the Appropriation Act is in place, this House, in order to enable the Government to function--- I do not think we are as irresponsible as to deny the Government funds to function. That would be irresponsible of this House. But to give them 50 per cent is questionable because it is not justified! The Minister has not shown justification as to why it should be 50 per cent and not 30 per cent, 40 per cent or even 70 per cent. Okay, 70 per cent would be against the Constitution. But, Mr. Minister, how do we know that if we give you 50 per cent, you will be able to spend it before we have the Appropriation Bill approved? That is because between now and the time the Appropriation Bill is approved is only four months. The Appropriation Bill ought to have been approved and passed by 30th October, according to the way we do business in this House. That is four months from now. If you really want to do the lazy job, why do you not do four over 12 times the amount of money you want, so that by the time the Appropriation Act is in force, you will have spent your money for the four months? Why do you want six months? So, I would like to suggest that the Minister justifies to us - if he has actually done that homework - on a Ministry by Ministry basis why he requires 50 per cent. There is no need to approve money so that it just lies there and yet you do not need it. That is misusing the House! Even trying to dangle to us the carrot of CDF and the issue that our salaries or this House will not function, is actually a form of blackmail. We do not accept that. We need to be convinced that, indeed, the Minister needs 50 per cent or if he needs more, then he should justify. But he cannot get more because the Constitution will not allow him to do so. Mr. Speaker, Sir, I know that there is an appropriate amendment coming. We want to reduce this figure to fit in. Since the Minister seems to be very comfortable with linear extrapolation, we will use that to allow him to spend four months equivalent of the full year's Budget which will be about 30 per cent. With those few remarks, I oppose the Motion and look forward to an amendment that we can support. June 25, 2008 PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES 1415"
}