PNP will redevelop the Road Maintenance Fund – Mikael Phillips

Mikael Phillips, shadow minister of transport and works, says, should the People’s National Party (PNP) be voted back into power, they will redevelop the Road Maintenance Fund.

“We will re-establish a road maintenance fund because it is the right thing to do!” said Phillips who was one of five presenters at the PNP’s inaugural Time Come to Put People First Town Hall Meeting at Bridgeport High School in Portmore, St. Catherine.

Formerly, the Road Maintenance Fund board managed the pool of funds for the specific maintenance of main roads and structures islandwide, pursuant to section four of the Main Roads Act.

There are over 5000 km of roadway designated as main road which fell under the purview of the board. The scope of the maintenance work involved periodic and routine maintenance of roads, structures and matters incidental thereto.

A dedicated fund for the maintenance of the main road network was established by the Road Maintenance Fund Act of 2002. Funding was received from the Inland Revenue Department on a monthly basis and was calculated at one third of total collection of the island’s motor licence fees. A two-and-half-per- cent handling fee was deducted by the Inland Revenue Department for administrative purposes.

Disbursement to the Fund commenced in August 2003.

In May 2009, the Bruce Golding administration introduced a special consumption tax of $8.75 on fuel, of which 20 per cent should go to the Road Maintenance Fund. A Gleaner report notes that in November 2017, Prime Minister Andrew Holness piloted a bill in Parliament to abolish the Road Maintenance Fund and transfer its functions to the Ministry of Economic Growth and Job Creation by March 2018.

Phillips contends that it is under the Andrew Holness-led Government, that the road maintenance fund was locked down.

He argues that there is no modern economy in the world that can take funding from central government to maintain the road networks that Jamaica has.

“We’re not only going to be looking at NWA roads. We’ll have to look at municipal council roads too, because that forms part of the road network that every single Jamaican use. Ninety per cent of our roads are controlled by the municipal council, 90 per cent, so it makes no sense we say we’re going to fix NWA roads and we leave out parish council roads when it’s one government we’re talking about,” Phillips said.

TRANSPORT HUB

In addition to the modernisation of roads, Phillips highlighted his disappointment that a transport centre that had earlier been proposed to be built in Portmore had not been done.

“Under the People’s National Party’s Government, in 2015, we negotiated with the Belgians and we made a proposal to build a transport hub, just like the one in Half-Way Tree right here in Portmore, and everything crash under this JLP government,” Phillips said.

He said before the government was changed in 2016, the PNP negotiated with the Belgians, lands were identified and the loan was ... tied up, and that all crashed.

“Not only did it crash, but the Belgian government ended up being very upset with the Government of Jamaica, because we never went any further with the negotiations. All we had to do was to give was our portion and we found every excuse not to, and the result of that is that Portmore will not have a transport centre,” he said.

Phillips said at that time, the transport centre for Portmore would have cost $5.8 billion dollars. He said the cost to build that transport centre now would be no less than $15 billion.

Phillips noted that in 2016, the JUTC had 115 buses leaving from Portmore and transporting about 75,000 to 80,000 Jamaicans. In 2022, there are now 40 buses leaving the Portmore terminus, and by 9 a.m., there are only 20 buses in operation.

He emphasised that the incoming 50 buses which the government has purchased, which have not yet reached the island, will still not solve the problems of the JUTC.

“Anytime you hear the minister of transport, who three-quarters of the time is sleeping in Parliament, or you can’t hear we, mash down that lie that 50 buses will solve the problem of the JUTC!” Phillips said.

Phillips said that the PNP would be ordering enough buses to retire the old fleet should they be voted into power.

ainsworth.morris@gleanerjm.com