It appears that recently-sworn-in Finance Minister and interim Justice Minister Richard Gibson started on the right foot in efforts to improve relations with the Netherlands (see today’s story).
Particularly where it regards the role of the Committee for Financial Supervision CFT and related decisions by the Kingdom Council of Ministers there had been some friction.
Hard as he tried, former minister Martin Hassink seemed to have trouble convincing both entities of his approach to dealing with issues such as a conceived persistent deficit and debts to Social and Health Insurance SZV as well as the general pension fund APS.
Hopefully his successor will fare better, as December is on the doorstep and this year’s budget still has not been approved, so no badly-needed capital investments can be made. Meanwhile, the 2016 version is already long overdue.
The new minister has stated that St. Maarten will comply fully with the instruction, although obviously not by the original November 1 deadline. He believes the end of January is a more realistic target to get it all done and will discuss that with CFT.
The latter makes more sense than to continue appealing to the Council of State, also because experience has shown that in the end The Hague usually gets its way regardless. But the big question is how, because by now any measures to either lower cost or increase income obviously won’t have much of an effect in 2015 anymore.
Perhaps the so-called realisation figures on what actually has been spent so far can help in the sense of adjusting the annual expenditures downward so they match real income. In addition, it’s crucial to settle the payment arrears to SZV and APS, which CFT set as condition to defer compensation for shortfalls from previous years.
Having been on the board of CFT may be an advantage to Minister Gibson, as that’s where backing for his policies in this matter must come from. Time will tell, but he’s certainly on the money when saying Government should not spend more than it collects.
