Cash saved with end of controversial fund

(CNS): The finance minister said that at the end of the 2013/14 financial year government came in under budget by $2 million on its transfer payments. Marco Archer said the administration had spent $31.1 million in its first year in office on these payments instead of the planned $33 million because of changes it made to scholarships under the controversial Nation Building Fund.

Marco Archer, Minister of Finance & Economic Development (Photo by Dennie Warren Jr)

“Part of these savings stemmed from the government’s efforts to regularise the Young Nation Builders Scholarship Programme by properly aligning the terms and conditions of those scholarships with those of the Education Council to ensure equal treatment for all persons receiving scholarships from the government,” the minister said during his budget address for the 2015/16 fiscal year.

One of the more controversial moves of the former premier, McKeeva Bush, the National Building Fund was described as a “slush fund” for Bush, now the opposition leader, and had caused concerns because of the lack of clear criteria for grants.

The fund was established by Bush in 2010 when he took money from legal aid and other areas of the budget to create a pool of cash to give to applicants for scholarships that had not been able to get money from the Education Council, as well as to fund church programmes and expansions, charities and what were perceived to be good causes. However, the allocation of the money and the decision regarding who got what was questioned as the final decision appeared to be in the hands of the premier on an ad hoc basis.

A hot topic throughout his administration, making headlines on a regular basis, it also became a key area of criticism of the UDP and Bush during the 2013 election campaign – by which time some ten million dollars have been handed out to various applicants and organisations.

Minister Archer was one of its fiercest critics, stating during several of the campaign debates that he believed the money given away, particularly to churches, amounted to “nothing more than corruption”.

On coming to office the PPM government ended the fund, but with several young people depending on the scholarships the administration moved those grants under the Education Council. In some cases the amounts were readjusted as students had been given scholarships that were as much as three or four times the maximum amount given to students who had qualified under the regular system.

The Office of the Auditor General has conducted a review of the NBF but the report has not yet been released. A spokesperson for the office confirmed that this is one of a number of reports currently awaiting contributions from government officials before it can be released to the Legislative Assembly and then into the public domain.