Independent parliamentarian Joanne Massiah has likened the 2018 budget, presented in the Lower House on Thursday, to an act of illusory magic.
Massiah was giving her reaction to the $1.2b budget minutes after Prime Minister Gaston Browne made his presentation to a packed House.
“This is what I can describe as a Houdini budget. It is full of illusions, it is full of magic tricks and the people of this country, if they have never done it before, they have got to put on their analytical hats and their critical thinking skills and dissect this budget in a way a budget has never been dissected.
“It’s clearly an election budget,” she said on local radio.
According to her, the budget is filled with unrealistic promises, and she questioned how exactly the 5 percent increase to public servants and the other incentives outlined would be financed.
“The increase to public servants, it’s done in a vacuum. He says 5 percent, 5 percent really, when you think about the recent increases to social security, when you think of … cost of living going up every single week.
“People in this country are bawling [and] the 5 percent increase is going to have zero impact,” Massiah opined.
She added that the PM failed to address reducing the price of fuel at the pump and other “real issues” that affect people in a tangible way.
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