Finance Minister Colm Imbert says his workload was too heavy and he was grateful for Prime Minister Keith Rowley’s “intervention” in appointing Minister in the Office of the Prime Minister PM, Stuart Young, to chair the Cabinet’s Finance and General Purposes sub-committee .
“His intervention has taken a lot of pressure off of me,”Imbert said yesterday denying he was being punished for his performance and recent controversies including his “0-0-0” wage restraint statements and “rioting” quip about gas price hikes.
Rowley confirmed in Parliament on Wednesday that Young now chairs the F&GP committee — which deals with major matters before Cabinet decides on them.
Imbert headed that since Government assumed office in September last year.
UNC MP Ganga Singh had asked if it was accepted protocol for the Finance Minister to chair F&GP. Rowley said former PNM Minister Lenny Saith had chaired F&GP for five years though he wasn’t in Finance.
Saith was Minister in the Office of the Prime Minister and had headed Planning, Public Administration and Information, and Energy. Imbert said yesterday the change was made by the PM two weeks ago.
“My workload is extremely heavy. In addition to Finance duties and the difficult task of restructuring of the economy in the face of the collapse in energy revenues, establishing the new public procurement system, implementing the property tax, managing the Government’s divestment programme for 2017, etc, etc, I chair several other Government committees and have oversight of over 50 State enterprises also.”
“The PM was of the view, that I was very much overloaded. The adjustment will free up some of my time to attend to my substantive work, which I appreciate.”