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"id": 246521,
"url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/246521/?format=api",
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"speaker_name": "Mr. Kipchumba",
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"id": 313,
"legal_name": "Joseph Kipchumba Lagat",
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"content": "Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, I beg to give my comments on the Budget Speech. I am not in support of the fact that the Minister for Finance increased the Roads Maintenance Levy by Kshs3.20. You are aware that the price of petroleum is, indeed, high. Therefore, increasing it further is making life quite unbearable for Kenyans. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, the road licence that every motorist would buy for his vehicle was used to do many things. First, it was very cheap. Secondly, it was a security document. We all know that before you were given a road licence you had to ascertain that, indeed, the vehicle belonged to you. What will happen now? People can now get insurance certificates from anywhere now that they will not be required to prove that the vehicles are theirs. We are all aware that the road licence is a Government document which bears all the necessary security items. I look at it differently that it is unacceptable for us to do away with the road licence. I want to request the Government to rethink the issue of doing away with the road licence. An additional Kshs3.20 on the Road Maintenance Levy amounts to punishing the common man. The road licence would only be obtained by those people with money. A person who owns a vehicle cannot easily fail to pay Kshs3,000, Kshs6,000 or whatever cost for one year. All our tractors that use diesel and are never driven on our roads will now be required to pay Kshs3.20 extra per every litre of diesel consumed. Why could the Minister not have ensured that, at least, our farmers do not pay that amount of money? I have argued many times in this House that if, indeed, we want to assist the common man in this country--- What is going to happen is that by simply increasing the Roads Maintenance Levy by Kshs3.20, farmers are going to pay a lot of extra money in our constituencies in order to do all their farming activities. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, I wish to urge the Minister to rethink seriously about increasing the Roads Maintenance Levy. In fact, I would like to request him to reverse that measure immediately. It is unacceptable in this country because we have been saying that we want to redistribute wealth in our country. How do we redistribute wealth in our country when we are making the life of the common man more unbearable? Everybody uses fuel! I do not know whether there is a formula that the Minister will use to ensure that farmers in my constituency do not pay that extra money. I was very much disappointed. Every other thing in this Budget looked good until the Minister said that the road licence will be scrapped. For a moment I thought that he was giving us some form of relief, but when he said that he was going to recapture that by increasing the Roads Maintenance Levy, I was very disappointed. Look at it this way. If your vehicle is stolen, it is very easy to locate it when it has a road licence. Anybody can walk to an insurance broker and get an insurance certificate. However, you cannot walk anywhere to get a road licence because one has to produce his or her logbook in order for it to be ascertained that the vehicle is genuinely owned. I, therefore, wish there would have been proper consultation between the Ministry of Finance and the Kenya Police. I am not sure that the June 20, 2006 PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES 1445 Kenya Police were consulted as much as I am aware that in the past the police have used road licences to get their own personal tax. The overall cost to this country will be enormous. I would like the respective security agents to advise the Government. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, the growth rate of our economy of 5.8 per cent is quite good for our country. However, economic growth alone backed by uneven distribution of resources is nothing. While we appreciate that more resources will now go to the rural areas, we must ensure- -- Kenya has been ranked as one of the most unequal countries in terms of wealth distribution. I wish the Minister could focus more on this when it comes to taxation. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, we must encourage savings. Kenya is one of the few countries in the world with very low savings. Those who have done Economics know that savings are equal to investment. Without savings, we cannot invest. I wonder why the Minister wants to tax allowances given to Members of Parliament. That is a proposal that I will not support. Personally, I will oppose it because my constituents \"tax\" it back in the constituency. They do so through church and medical harambees. It would be better for me to be taxed by my constituents than by the Government. This is because we are not sure if all that money will find its way to the rightful place. I believe there was a reason to exempt taxation on the allowances paid to hon. Members. We cannot, after 40 years of Independence, tax those allowances. The Kshs50,000 that is given as constituency allowance is only enough for one weekend. We need much more to sustain our activities in the constituencies. I wish the Minister does not play politics in this House. We must be practical; state factual issues and implement them. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, I welcome the youth fund. However, it must not be at the expense of the creation of the 500,000 jobs a year as promised by this Government. The youth fund should continue alongside the Government's pledge to create 500,000 jobs every year. The Government should not only talk about creating these job opportunities in the informal sector. When we ask many Kenyans whether there are job opportunities that have been created in their constituencies, they say: \"We are not aware of any.\" Whilst the Government claims to have created over 400,000 job opportunities, we would like in the same breath, to be told how many jobs have been lost in this country. Many businesses are being shut down. I am yet to be convinced that, indeed, those job opportunities have been created. I know that in terms of growth, it takes time to feel the benefits. However, we should not just throw figures for the sake of it because we want to do politics. The statutory allocation for the Kenya Roads Board (KRB) has been reduced from 3 per cent to 2 per cent. The argument for this is that the 1 per cent will be allocated to Nairobi City because it contributes most of the tax. That is an uncalled for argument. If every region says that it contributes more tax it must take the lion's share, then the coastal region should be allocated all the taxes collected in this country because we import all our goods through the Port of Mombasa. Most of us stay in Nairobi, but over the weekends, we go to our constituencies. If that is the case, we contribute a lot of money in terms of Road Maintenance Levy through farming activities. Therefore, we must then be allocated a lot of money. The Minister's argument does not, in my view, hold any sense. The Minister should refrain from making such reckless statements. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, with those few remarks, I beg to support."
}