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Former Prime Minister Mahendra Chaudhry said the state budget 2024-25 did not meet the expectations of the common people for relief
Rising cost of living
In a statement, the leader of Fiji’s Labour Party slammed Prime Minister Sitiveni Rabuka’s claim that the government was listening to the people’s calls for relief.
“The budget clearly shows that they haven’t listened. This is just empty talk to fool people.”
“Beyond cosmetic changes here and there, the suffering and hardship of the vast majority of people will continue,” Chaudhry said.
He said the 15 per cent VAT levied in the previous financial year remained unchanged and stressed that the decision not to tax dividends or cancel the seven-year tax break given to Fiji Water showed the Government was bent on protecting the interests of the rich at the expense of the poor.
Chaudhry said raising the minimum wage from $4 to $5 an hour is not enough.
“From August 1, the price of gas will increase by 50 cents, and from April 1, 2025, the price of gas will increase by another 50 cents.”
He said that in 2018, Professor Prasad had called for a minimum wage of $5 an hour and questioned how he could justify keeping the minimum wage at the same level six years later despite the fact that in the last budget he had introduced a 15% VAT, which led to a significant increase in the cost of living.
“Social welfare benefits remain unchanged at $125 per month.”
“All he did was add a $25-a-month bus fare subsidy to welfare. These are the people at the bottom of society who are most affected by the high cost of living.”
“To make matters worse, the age for receiving unemployment insurance has been raised from 60 to 65.”
He also said that Finance Minister Prasad’s claim that his government respects the rights of workers and trade unions is just rhetoric and quite hypocritical.
“He unilaterally demanded a 7%-20% pay raise for civil servants and a $1 per hour raise for hourly workers, which completely undermined the union’s collective bargaining rights. The proposed pay raise is far below what the union is asking for and is unlikely to be accepted by the union.”
“Meanwhile, the government shamelessly continues to support increasing
The salaries and allowances recommended by the Parliamentary Remuneration Commission.
It completely ignores the huge public outrage over this selfish act.”
Chowdhury added that while they welcomed the budget announcement as a sign that the Government had finally ended the long-running dispute between the Fiji Mineworkers Union and FNPF pensioners, more needed to be done to compensate members of the fund who were forced to withdraw their savings to get through the Covid crisis, which should have been the responsibility of the state.
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