Rose­marie Sant

The Min­istry of Fi­nance has clamped down on Gov­ern­ment spend­ing for Christ­mas func­tions, ad­vis­ing that be­cause of the “cur­rent fi­nan­cial con­straints” it is putting a halt to any spend­ing of bud­getary al­lo­ca­tions for par­ties.

By memo dat­ed No­vem­ber 21, the min­istry ad­vised that be­cause of the fi­nan­cial sit­u­a­tion, min­istries, de­part­ments, state bod­ies should not use “monies al­lo­cat­ed through the bud­getary process and the funds col­lect­ed in the pur­suit of gov­ern­ment busi­ness, for staff end of year and/or Christ­mas par­ties, chil­dren Christ­mas par­ties,” or for gifts, to­kens, vouch­ers etcetera for dis­tri­b­u­tion to staff.

The mem­o­ran­dum said if any of the gov­ern­ment agen­cies, min­istries or state boards want to have these func­tions they can “be fund­ed from staff con­tri­bu­tion and oth­er staff fund-rais­ing ac­tiv­i­ties,” but they must not be “sub­sidised from pub­lic funds.”

Gov­ern­ment min­is­ters yes­ter­day told the T&T Guardian that even be­fore the di­rec­tive was is­sued there had been dis­cus­sions and a de­ci­sion had been tak­en not to spend any mon­ey on Christ­mas events. They said while “spread­ing the Christ­mas cheer and good­will is im­por­tant,” it can­not be done at the “ex­pense of tax­pay­ers.”

Plan­ning and De­vel­op­ment Min­is­ter Camille Robin­son-Reg­is said at the lev­el of the per­ma­nent sec­re­tary there had been a dis­cus­sion and there was a de­ci­sion ear­ly that “it will be pot-luck” and each di­vi­sion of the min­istry will be in­vit­ed to par­tic­i­pate and bring meals which they will pre­pare.

“There will be no spend­ing of any pub­lic funds on any Christ­mas par­ty,” she said.

Asked about monies for dec­o­ra­tions, she said they are us­ing dec­o­ra­tions from pre­vi­ous years.

“We are do­ing it like we do at home, us­ing what we have,” she said.

Trade Min­is­ter Paula Gopee-Scoon said “her min­istry is al­so go­ing the way of pot-luck and us­ing old dec­o­ra­tions.” At a per­son­al lev­el, she said she had al­so tak­en a de­ci­sion this year “not to buy any presents. Mon­ey which would have been spent on presents will be giv­en to char­i­ty be­cause things have got­ten that much more dif­fi­cult for many peo­ple.”

Sev­er­al oth­er gov­ern­ment min­is­ters al­so con­firmed “good­will” will be shared with in-house gath­er­ings and staff be­ing asked to con­tribute to meals.