FINANCE MINISTER CRITICISED P.A.C OVER HEARINGS

The Finance Minister has criticised the Public Accounts Committee saying he was surprised at some of the organisations the Committee had invited to answer questions during its hearings.

Snyder Rini told Parliament, he thanks the World Bank, the Asian Development Bank, the IMF and State Owned Enterprises for attending the hearings but the National Budget does not belong to them.

Mr Rini also said any Public Accounts Committee hearing on budgets takes only three to four days, but the 2015 hearings took a week.

“I would also like to thank the organisations like the World Bank, Asian Development Bank and also the SOEs for coming to the PAC to answer the various questions raised. Mr Speaker, no wonder the PAC has taken one week because it has gone to a trouble of asking the World Bank, ADB and IMF for the budget and also the SOEs. Mr Speaker this is not a budget for World Bank, ADB, IMF and not for the SOEs. It is for the government, for the country and I am so surprised that the PAC has called on all these groups to be present bat its sitting.”

The Finance Minister also complained that the Public Accounts Committee report on this year’s budget was very technical and thick.

“Mr Speaker, I am also concerned about the report that the Committee has brought to Parliament. A very thick and huge report full of graphs, we are only laymen as members of parliament but this report is very technical, very technical report Mr Speaker, as you can see it has a lot of graphs and economic terms.”

The Finance Minister made the comments this afternoon while responding to contributions Members of Parliament made on the National Budget in Parliament.

Meanwhile, the budget, which stands at over $4 billion, has been committed to the Committee of Supply.

Parliament is adjourned to nine-thirty am tomorrow.