CIG to spend about $8M on tourism payout
(CNS): Caymanians who lost their jobs in the tourism sector could receive a $1,000 per month for three months from government in an effort to keep them going until Cayman begins to reopen to visitors. The number of people who registered with the tourism ministry increased over the weekend after the deadline was extended, and around 2,700 have now signed up for this stipend. This will cost government around CI$8.1 million.
Premier Alden McLaughlin said the subsidy would prop up those who have been worst hit economically by the COVID-19 pandemic but still have a job to go back to once visitors return.
However, the number is considerably lower than the government’s previous estimates of how many local people work in tourism. Before lockdown, it had said that around 4,200 jobs in Cayman were dependent on cruise tourism alone, most of which were held by locals. But the final number of registered tourism workers across all the tourism sectors still falls well short of that figure.
Speaking at the press briefing Friday, McLaughlin denied that the figures government used to justify the port project were wrong, describing them as “pretty solid” and said that “we did not just pluck them out of the air”.
The premier said that the vast majority of people employed in the tourism sector are on work permits, even if the businesses are owned by Caymanians. However, he said that the cruise related tourism jobs were held by local people, despite the much lower number of people having registered.
McLaughlin said he believed that there were “a number of factors at play” that might have prevented people from signing up for the free money. But he said that the government was constantly adjusting how it planned to support those in the tourism sector.
He said government was now grappling with how it was going to help the businesses that are about to fold because they are entirely dependent on visitors for their livelihoods. Government would have to offer substantially more financial assistance to the owners to keep them afloat as this stipend was for individual workers, he said.
“We have got to prop up as many businesses as we can on the basis that tourism is going to recover and people are going to come back here,” he said. “We want as many businesses to be able to survive this time as possible within government’s ability to do so.”
However, the support government is extending to tourism has seen some backlash as local people who have lost their jobs or been furloughed in other sectors have questioned why those in tourism have been singled out for support.
Government is taking an ad hoc approach to the support given to the unemployed, with most being directed to an overwhelmed and underfunded Needs Assessment Unity. They are also hoping that the pension withdrawal scheme will help people survive until their jobs return or new opportunities emerge as the economy begins to reopen and recover.
But it has been inclined to offer more direct funding to the tourism sector because of the complete collapse of this economic pillar.
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Cant you see that election is right around the corner….early campaigning ..what happened to their pensions? These guys never stop. Come may 2021.
So we are not including people who are married with children? Some people have been in tourism for a long time. Some people get seamen, NAU already, which is why they don’t need to sign up. What about people who own businesses in tourism. Well, one thing we all going to find out soon enough is how important them people who worked in tourism. There is going to be a lot of things I’m going to need less of, bars and restaurants. I don’t need to buy a new car or truck or go on vacation. Many things that I did before when I was working and making good money are now not necessary. I will buy cheaper rum and cigars. I have accepted to go back in time and I have breadfruit,neeseberry, mangoes, akee, avocado,bottlers and cassava. Grandfather said always be prepared.
The government made good money last year over a billion. So we need to pay people at least $2000 per month per family. All those businesses that offer CI$6-8 per hour shouldn’t worry rent is going down. The cost of living will go down or close. We all in this boat together. So we need to plug the hole with new wood or lose our pretty boat. Weed and other drugs will be the new employment like it was before. Boating and seamanship will still be progressing just different customers. This reminds me of a movie I saw years ago Idiocracy, the future?
i would like the gov. To look into a trend that happens here all too often- persons come from countries I won’t call . and get jobs in hotels because the US doesn’t allow them straight into from their countries to work. They have friends who give them positions such as bell stand managers front of house managers, which should be local jobs an there are locals trained well enough to do those jobs, then they apply for jobs in the Us. It becomes easier to gain access to the us Hotel chains once you have worked in the chain here.( should clear up the hotel) I wouldn’t mind it if they also took Caymanians or anyone not in there circle up with them but they usually push them down. Actually writing this made me realize I’m just jealous
As I listened to Alden today, it reminded me of the old saying, he who feels it knows it..
These guys can throw around millions of the governments money for extravagant trips to Monaco, London junkets, paving of roads, $9Million to promote the port without our consent, and still wasting money on fighting the referendum.. If they can do this, without a thought, I can see why they don’t want to help their own people..If Alden could walk a day in the average Caymanian shoes he would feel what we feel now..Not a month goes by that he is not paid unlike most of us that suffer through…His fallback is, why don’t we go to NAU? Has anybody tried this and willing to give a good positive outcome?
We have become slaves to the politicians…Go beg at their feet if we want anything. I am still on my hands and knees in front of them and not a dollar has reached my pockets..Do I need to bend over now?
No matter what they do it is still No Weed! No Vote!!
Elvis, you should team up with the “fix the dump” guy. Great team 😉
I’m not Elvis but I do admire him
Now heres a realistic we to support the local tourism industry!!
$9M for the Port, now $8M to save the Votes…You can’t make this up…What about the rest of us without work and broke..
I am at the point now that I would let them buy my vote just so that I can survive..
Where is this money tree at that they keep plucking all the dollars from?
Yea I need some off that tree as well; better than breadfruit!
It is called the private sector, mainly financial services. A group of people who have taken pay cuts and donated hundreds of thousands, and are getting increasingly pissed off and governments failure to make even the most basic of cost cutting measures.