Budget has fallen short: Lelang

OPPOSITION leader Joseph Lelang says Budget 2023 has fallen short of providing relief to people and more can be done.
“While we acknowledge that the housing assistance package is intended to provide relief for Papua New Guinean families, as real wages are affected and the purchasing power of the pay packet drops, we feel that more can be done,” he said.
“Budget 2023 has fallen a bit short in trying to insulate our people and our country from the external forces that the treasurer (Ian Ling-Stuckey) has highlighted in his speech.” While debating Budget 2023 in Parliament, he noted that many people affected were not on a regular payroll and were doing what they could to make ends meet and was concerned about how they were going to be affected because they did not benefit from the income tax relief.
“The budget is an important instrument of Government, to stabilise and grow the economy, through its public investment programme in creating jobs, controlling and keeping inflation low and creating an environment that is conducive for private sector growth and investment,” he said. “How do we address the cost of those not on a regular payroll?
“It is difficult to see how jobs will be created in the Budget 2023.
“There is a lot more the Opposition expects out of this budget; a lot of critical areas need funding but a lot have been addressed by the budget.”
Of the concerns he raised, Lelang added that money available to the National Parliament and Judiciary should not be subject to cuts.
“We must maintain the separation of powers of the three arms of Government in PNG and that no arm must be seen to be dominating the other,” he said.
Lelang also highlighted a major discrepancy in how there were two different sets of numbers presented by Ling-Stuckey, through his speech on the bills and in the budget document itself.
“The grant for general expenditure of K24 billion that was tabled on Tuesday, inclusive of the bills, of which the capital expenditure is K9 billion while operational expenditure is K14 billion; this is different to the figures quoted to the Treasurer’s own budget speech and budget documents,” he said.
Lelang said that the appropriation bills revealed a lower amount of K553 million as stated in the volumes.
He asked Ling-Stuckey to explain the K60 million difference in the capital budget and K493 million difference in the operational budget, before the budget was passed.
“The Government is asking Parliament to approve and pass into law, the appropriation bills for the recurrent and capital budget, which in total is K553 million less than what is in the rest of Budget 2023,” Lelang said.