2018/19 Budget Communication 2018_2019 BUDGET COMMUNICATION | Page 77

The bottom line is that the yield of our revenue
system, at 16.1 per cent of GDP in 2017/18, is well below
the revenue yields found elsewhere in the region, where
yields average in the area of 25 per cent of GDP, and
certainly is inadequate to the needs of a modern government.
In reviewing the fiscal outturn for 2017/18, it is
also incumbent on me to clarify the figure for debt
redemption.
This clarification is necessary due to the
persistent campaign of misinformation, perpetrated in part
by some in this Honorable House who certainly know better,
but refuse to do better. They and other pundits – finding no
real fault in this government’s progress in addressing the
fiscal maladies it met in place – have sought willfully to
misrepresent the government’s fiscalactivities and financial
position for self-serving political gain.
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