DLP leader: Response to BRA missing money not enough

The Mia Mottley administration must still take full responsibility for its actions even though more than $6 million that the Auditor General’s report said had been unaccounted for at one of the Barbados Revenue Authority (BRA) collection points has “magically” appeared.

Director of Finance and Economic Affairs Ian Carrington said in Government’s response to the report last week that the money thought to be missing was simply at a different collection point.

The $6.62 million flagged by Auditor General Leigh Trotman was the difference between what the cashier’s report for one BRA collection point stated and what the Central Bank indicated was collected.

“It was magically found. I don’t know how you lose $6 million dollars and then in a response it reappears,” Yearwood told Barbados TODAY in an interview at the weekend.

“As I said yesterday, we welcome the response from the director of finance but I want us to remember the director of finance is not a political appointee. He’s a civil servant, he’s a professional but at the end of the day the Government and those responsible must take responsibility for what the Auditor General’s report is recommending,” Dr Yearwood insisted.

Trotman had called for swift action, as he complained that “no explanation was presented for this significant difference which should be investigated as a matter of urgency”.

“Strangely enough, there were no responses to the political solutions from the Auditor General. So no response that theAuditor General’s [Office] needs more staff – and it is obviously understaffed which hampers the job that you can do. No response said to ‘let’s get the public accounts committee started, appoint an independent senator to chair it so you have a very technical response type of report’,” Yearwood said.

The DLP president added that a political response to what the Auditor General’s report identified was lacking.

“That is sad because we are still not getting the integrity legislation, still don’t have the idea of open government, still don’t have the Freedom of Information Act, so we still don’t have all the things,” he lamented.

“But, you know, we welcome the responses from the director of finance, we are thankful he’s taking his job seriously as a civil servant – that’s the professionalism we like to see. We have to praise that but we also have to understand he is not a political appointee. Those in the civil service must know not to be used as political scapegoats for what should be a government taking responsibility for its decisions and its actions,” he added. (MR)