Barbados Prime Minister Mia Amor Mottley to Deliver 2024 Financial Statement and Budget Proposals

The business community, trade unions, consumer advocates, other interest groups and individual Barbadians will learn today if their wish is Prime Minister Mia Amor Mottley’s command.

Mottley, who is Minister of Finance, Economic Affairs and Investment, is scheduled to deliver the 2024 Financial Statement and Budgetary Proposals at 3 p.m. in the House of Assembly.

The lead-up to the presentation has heard the traditional calls for reduced taxation, and an overall ease in the high cost of living, while there have also been suggestions of the need to stimulate investment.

General secretary of the Congress of Trade Unions and Staff Associations of Barbados, Dennis De Peiza, and general secretary of the National Union of Public Workers, Richard Green, have a wish list calling for tax relief for workers.

The Barbados Chamber of Commerce and Industry (BCCI), through its president James Clarke, communicated its wish for importrelated value added tax (VAT) and import duties to be calculated using a different formula because, in the BCCI’s view, the existing system is too susceptible to the rising international freight costs. (SC)