We believe in consultations, dialogue and making sure people are free to raise issues – Prof. Prasad

As a government, we believe in consultations, dialogue and making sure that people are free to engage and raise issues with the Government, Ministers and everyone else.

This was stated by Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Finance Professor Biman Prasad during the budget consultation at Nadi Civic Centre.

Professor Prasad says as part of that process, they started by organising a National Economic Summit that they had promised, and it was a huge success.

He says more than 500 people attended and they had to stop more people from attending the summit due to the exceeding number of attendees.

He adds they received complaints from the people in the western division because they could not attend the summit and that is why they are in the west to hear the people’s voices on the budget.

Professor Prasad says when they got into Government before the schools reopened this year, there was an allocation of $50 million to ensure our students were supported starting from pre-school to year 13.

He says the Government also provided $200 to all students from primary education to secondary education to help them prepare for a new school year.

He adds a total of 214,000 students were helped at an appropriate time and positive feedback was received from the recipients that the money distributed by the Government was put to good use.