Youth and Sports Budget Passed by National Assembly

On the Open Your Eyes Morning Show on Tuesday, Devin Daly, the new Minister of State in the Ministry of Youth and Sports, emphasized the need for more efficiency within the ministry. He dropped some big news about the current budget and hinted at changes to the staff structure. His comments have sparked quite a buzz among youth advocates, sports fans, and the Public Service Union. Everyone seems to agree that the Department of Youth Services and the National Sports Council need a major revamp. But the P.S.U. insists that any changes must be carefully planned to avoid hurting real people. Meanwhile, youth advocates are pushing for more inclusion and a stronger commitment to investing in sports and developing athletes. News Five’s Paul Lopez dives into the details.

 

Paul Lopez, Reporting

On Tuesday morning, Devin Daly, the Minister of State in the Ministry of Youth and Sports, stirred up quite a bit of controversy. He revealed that the Ministry of Youth and Sports has to split a budget of seven and a half million dollars.

 

Devin Daly, Minister of State, Ministry of Youth and Sports (File: April 8^th, 2025)

“The reality is we have accessible to us, about seven and a half million between youth and sports. However, seven out of that seven and a half million is on salaries. We are using five hundred thousand between youth and sports to really bring program work.”

 

But this isn’t breaking news. What Minister Daly mentioned is actually outlined in the Government of Belize’s approved 2024/2025 budget. A whopping ninety-five percent of the just over eight million dollars is allocated to recurrent expenses like salaries, travel, subsistence, materials, supplies, and operational costs. That leaves only about five percent, or five hundred thousand dollars, for rehabilitation programs, skills training, and maintaining sports facilities.

 

Devin Daly

“I don’t really believe that any taxpayer would be satisfied with getting that amount for sports and youth work within this country.”

 

Daly’s comments come just four weeks after he stepped into his new role as the junior minister in the Ministry of Youth and Sports, alongside Minister Anthony Mahler. With his background in professional sports and youth development, Daly is seen as a great fit for the job. Now, the challenge is to figure out how to run these important portfolios more efficiently and effectively. According to Ishmael Nicholson, the Commonwealth Youth Ambassador to Belize, youth participation in all areas of governance has nearly disappeared.

 

Ishmael Nicholson, Commonwealth Youth Ambassador to Belize

“In economics we learn that at a certain point where you have so much employees that the efficiency will continue to decrease. So, in economics we learn that more employees, less efficiency. So if the ministry believes that we have to cut to create more efficiency, and of course if we do it in a practical and proper way through its evaluation and assessments then I believe the youths will back it up, one hundred percent.”

 

A closer look at the five hundred thousand dollars earmarked for youth and sports investments reveals that no funds were allocated for youth development services in 2024, nor for youth programs and initiatives. The Youth for the Future Participation in Governance line item also got zero dollars. But what can you really expect from a budget that’s stretched so thin?

 

Ishmael Nicholson

“The most important thing that is missing for the ministry, beside the budget, is the national youth policy, which is the foundation for which the department will create the strategy for it to create more opportunities for growth for young people. So without that the department does not have a proper strategy to engage young people properly because that strategy is absent and youths are not involved within the department effectively and meaningfully we create youths becoming at risk in which we are suppose to prevent youths from becoming at risk youths.”

 

 

The sports budget paints a similar picture. Not a single dollar was set aside for youth programs and initiatives. Instead, more money was allocated for buying furniture and equipment—forty-six thousand dollars—than for maintaining sports facilities, which only got forty thousand dollars. This has resulted in poorly maintained facilities across the country and a serious lack of investment in athlete development.

 

Devin Daly

“As a government, our job is too fold, making sure that facilities is upkept and kept to a certain standard and work with the federation to ensure that the competition  and development side of youth sports and senior sports is caried out. One of the things that is dear to me is to make sure we keep these facilities to a certain standard and we have to apply pressure and ensure the federation are carrying out tournaments in the facilities we provide.”

But with the way the current budget for youth and sports is set up, there’s no financial wiggle room to boost youth involvement in governance through the DYS or to improve the maintenance of sports facilities. Reporting for News Five, I am Paul Lopez.