Ling-Stuckey plans meet to address issues with govt cheques

By HELEN TARAWA
TREASURER Ian Ling-Stuckey has told Parliament that he will call a meeting with the heads of commercial banks to address issues raised in Parliament about difficulties with Government cheques and payouts.
Ling-Stuckey, in response to questions by Bogia MP Robert Naguri and Lagaip-Porgera MP Tomait Kapili last Friday, said he would call a round-table meeting with Bank of Papua New Guinea governor Loi Bakani and relevant officers in Treasury and Finance to identify exactly where the issues were.
“We will try and see where we can amend some of those very stringent regulations that have been approved and practised by the banks,” he said.
“We want to see whether we can continue to meet the intentions of the anti-money laundering laws while we get rid of the red tape
and all of the things that have stopped our cheques from being banked.
“I will sit down with them and see if we can streamline the processes and procedures that exist in the private sector to better meet our needs.”
Ling-Stuckey explained that this happened when cheques were banked with commercial banks that had passed the laws under the Public Money Management Regularising Act.
He said the regulations had been complied with under the relevant financial instructions, adding that banks needed to cash those cheques as soon as possible.
Ling-Stuckey said with the questions raised by Kapili on bank fees charged by commercial banks, Bank South Pacific (BSP) announced a net profit of about K800 million and continued to charge fees to clear cheques.
“They are rising towards announcing in one or two years a net profit of a K1 billion and we applaud the management for providing equity for its return on shareholders,” he said.
“On the other hand, it’s frustrating to be able to witness the bank charging our little people and commercial customers fees.
“We will ask Bakani during our regular meetings to sit with the commercial banks through advocating strong arguments on our part to ask the banks to review some of these fees.”