PM Mottley announces no new taxes in national budget

BRIDGETOWN, Barbados, CMC – Prime Minister of Barbados Mia Mottley today said there would be no new taxes in the 2024 national budget she presented to Parliament, indicating though that there would be a review of the tax structures and increasing access to financing for the private and public sectors.

“It is a budget that will secure our Barbados of today and our Barbados for tomorrow. That security is anchored on our achievements against many odds so far, on the clear improvements we are seeing, and on the bright light of our rising star, which is the result of our joint effort,” Mottley told legislators.

The Government had early presented to Parliament the estimates for total expenditure for the financial year 2024-2025, on an accrual basis, at BDS$4,667.7 million, (One BDS$=US$0.50 cents) with BDS$3,422.9 million representing current expenditure and BDS$1,244.8 million representing capital expenditure and amortisation.

She said the fiscal package illuminates a future prosperity in which all Barbadians can share, and “a country in which our pride remains fully justified, because…it is built on our industry”.

She said that in the fiscal package, all Barbadians, whether at home or abroad, will see how their efforts can further contribute to the shared national prosperity, “how all of us can benefit from our labour to enjoy our share of that prosperity”.

“The Barbados star will continue to rise through the collective effort of all of our people, and together, sir, we will fully emerge from the period of deep economic and financial abyss, with its political origins, of course, in the lost decade of 2008 to 2018, from the social and economic tentacles of COVID-19 pandemic, and from the supply chain shackled by the Russia-Ukraine war, and its consequences and now compounded by the war in Gaza.”

She said Barbados can now go into a period of increased social stability and heightened and sustainable growth, but, insisted “we must work together, and we must plan together”.

But she told Parliament that while “there will be no new taxes…I am telling you up front that I will warn you that there will be some adjustments during the course of this year of a few rates that we will need the public to be able to bear if our services that depend on those rates are to keep up with the kind of service that Barbadians want”.

“Let me also make the point…that I am well aware that there are some issues which are of further concern to the country. I hear you, and I see you, and I feel you. The allegation of unsustainable national debt, the cost of living, the healthcare system, and more specifically, the Queen Elizabeth Hospital, the state of the roads, particularly the pothole repair, the access to jobs, especially for our young people, and, of course, the management of the education transformation effort,” the PM said.

Mottley said she intends to address these issues, but she wanted to give the country, first, the facts, and, second, an assurance about the national debt, adding “I do not take these things lightly”.

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