Open Post-Budget Consultative Committee Meetings

PARLIAMENTARY COMMITTEES SERIES 26/2023

Open Post-Budget Consultative Committee Meetings

Monday 11th December Only

The Minister of Finance and Economic Development presented the 2024 National Budget on Thursday 24th November, in the National Assembly chamber at the new Parliament building in Mount Hampden with a speech [link] that was a summary of the full 2024 National Budget Statement [link]. 

Debate on the Budget was then adjourned until Tuesday 12th December to allow MPs to digest the Budget during the intervening ten days, during which the National Assembly and the Senate would not be sitting.  MPs were to have been assisted in their task by the customary series of post-Budget events scheduled for Monday 4th to Thursday 7th December and announced by the Speaker in the House adjourned before it adjourned; these events were notified in Parliamentary Committee Series 24/2023 [link].

Unfortunately, it later became necessary for Parliament to cancel the arrangements for the events; the cancellation was notified in Veritas’ Parliamentary Committee Series 25/2023 over the weekend [link] ­– and to postpone the scheduled events until the week beginning on Monday 11th December.

Parliament has now circulated the new schedule for Post-Budget Portfolio Committee Meetings on the 2024 National Budget, which is available on the Veritas website [link] and is attached to this bulletin.

Rescheduled Portfolio Committee Meetings This Week

The new Schedule differs considerably from the cancelled schedule referred to in Parliamentary Committee Series 24/2023 [link]..  Each committee will have two meetings:

Post-Budget Consultative Meetings by Portfolio Committees [including Public Accounts Committee] There will be two meetings for each committee:

• Meeting No. 1 will be in open session [i.e., open to attendance by members of the public as observers only]  The purpose of the meeting is to conduct consultations on the their Analysis of the 2024 Budget from representatives of the Ministry/Ministries the committee supervises.

These meetings will all be held today, Monday 11th December, either at 10 am or 2 pm according to the attached schedule and in the Committee Room of the New Parliament Building at Mount Hampden specified therein [the relevant columns in the schedule’s table are shaded for readers’  convenience].

• Meeting No. 2 will be in closed session [i.e. not open to members of the public]  The purpose of the meeting will be considering and adopting the relevant committee’s reports on the Analysis of the  Budget allocations for the Ministry/Ministries concerned.  The report/s will be drafted by the committee clerk under the supervision of the committee chairperson, and, when adopted by the committee, will be presented during the debate on the 2024 Estimates of Expenditure [the Blue Book].

According to the attached schedule these meetings will be held on Wednesday 13th December at 2 pm or Thursday 13th December at 10 am.  Presumably the reports will also cover the other Budget entities – independent constitutional commissions and the National Prosecuting Authority – assigned to the Ministry/Ministries supervised by each committee.

Veritas makes every effort to ensure reliable information, but cannot take legal responsibility for information supplied.