Government commits K770mil to settle arrears

MORE than K770 million has been put aside to settle what the Government owes businesses and others, an official says.
Paul Flanagen, the adviser to Treasury Minister Ian Ling-Stuckey, said it included unpaid goods and services bills, capital arrears and overdue retirement payments.
“It’s a pretty brave thing for a new government to commit to repay what is estimated as over K4 billion in arrears. That’s an act of good faith with businesses having contracts with the Government,” Flanagen said.
“We have over K770 million put aside for goods and services and capital arrears, retirement arrears in this sort of budget.
“We have moved some of the retirement arrears to support higher level of education tuition subsidies that is thought to be important for families to support them (during) the Covid-19 crisis.
Flanagen said there were funds in the budget which would be disbursed.
He explained that some arrears were incurred because the request for payments did not follow procedures.
“But then it’s a question of how do you exercise judgment when you know a business has actually delivered a really good project or they actually had the authorisation for that project,” he said.