PSU’s Dean Flowers Calls for Thorough Audits with New Auditor General

President of the Public Service Union, Dean Flowers, criticised the government’s budget preparation process. On Tuesday, the union issued a statement questioning the fiscal management and potential corruption within the Sports Council. The union demanded an independent audit to verify budget figures and investigate corruption allegations.

Minister of State, Devin Daly, stated on Tuesday that $7.5 million has been allocated between youth and sports, with $7 million going towards staff salaries, leaving just $500,000 for actual programming and facility maintenance.

Flowers told News 5, “I think that the public service union has consistently stated that there is little seriousness given to the preparation of these budgets.” Flowers added that, despite the shift to performance-based budgeting, the approach has not changed significantly. “If you look at all the budgets of the last twenty or ten years, not much has changed in terms of the programme budgeting,” he added.

Flowers also pointed out the inefficiency in the youth and sports budget, calling it “just numbers thrown out there” without proper analysis or justification for the expenditures.

He linked the issue to the failure of the previous auditor general to conduct thorough audits of ministries. He said, “I am hoping that with the appointment of a new auditor general, that for once, all government ministries will be audited to ensure that whatever allocation is being made for them is being spent on what is aimed for.”