[UPDATED] Finance Minister: 7,000 still waiting for last year’s salary grant

SOME 7,000 people who had applied for the Salary Relief Grant last year are yet to be paid, Finance Minister Colm Imbert revealed on Friday at a virtual briefing, but should be paid within a week.

On Wednesday, Barataria/San Juan MP Saddam Hosein had publicly complained that hundreds of his constituents had never received this grant after applying, even as the Government was now set to roll out the programme once again.

The grant is to help workers who cannot work in periods when the country is locked down to curb covid19.

Imbert said, "With respect to the complaint about persons not being paid their grants, I actually got an update this morning. The total number of salary relief grants paid out by the Ministry of Finance as of May 21, today, (is) 86,196. The number of applicants still to be paid (is) 7,000.

"So that of the total of approximately 93,000, we had paid out over 90 per cent of those persons who applied and were deemed/found to be eligible."

He calculated that 93 per cent of the approved applicants had been paid, based on 86,196 as a proportion of 93,000.

"So I don't think it is accurate for this story to be outside there that there are huge numbers of persons who applied for the grant and didn't get it. It's just seven per cent or less.

"Secondly, these persons were persons who had no bank account or whose bank account was not functioning, and we have to pay these people by pre-loaded debit card. I am happy to report that of these 7,000, some 6,139 records have been forwarded to FCB to prepare debit cards for them and 5,000 cards have already been generated."

Imbert said the cards were being delivered by TTPost which had already delivered 1,000 cards.

"So I think within the next week or so we would have cleared out all 93,000 of the applications for the salary grant that were found to be valid."

Newsday asked about many complaints seen in the comment section of the livestream of his news briefing on Facebook from individuals complaining they had received no grant. Imbert replied, "The persons who are trolling on the Facebook page don't have any evidence to back up what they are saying."

He insisted his figures were factual.

"I'd advise you not to look at the comments on the feed. I'm sure you'd seen some of the usual suspects making derogatory comments. I have given you the facts. We have accessed that 93,000 persons who applied for the Salary Relief Grant were eligible and we have paid 86,000 and the other 7,000 will be paid in the next two weeks so we will achieve 100 per cent satisfaction."

At a UNC virtual briefing on Wednesday, Hosein said his party had publicly asked members of the public if they had applied for this grant and whether they had received it or not.

"In under 24 hours we got about 3,000 responses where persons have indicated that they have yet to still receive the Salary Relief Grant.

"We must remember the policy of the Government at that time was that there was some level of urgency to provide persons with grants simply because they were off jobs for about three months.

"A year has passed and some of those persons have not got that grant and yet the Government comes with the exact same promise again this year with salary relief grants."

He said he could offer anecdotal evidence that, in his constituency, hundreds of people had applied for the Salary Relief Grant, in addition to the Rental Assistance Grant, but were yet to receive a cent.

"That is something the Government continues to do, in terms of deny persons state resources." He said there were "heavy" criteria for people to access the grants.

Hosein said Opposition Leader Kamla Persad-Bissessar, at last Monday's UNC Virtual Report, said individuals have difficulty accessing the grant application forms online.

He said at the last budget debate in the Standing Finance Committee he and Oropouche West MP Davendranath Tancoo had questioned an allegedly unaccounted over $90 million with respect to the Salary Relief Grant, which he said Imbert had yet to answer. Newsday asked Imbert about a $97 million difference in his estimate ($129 million) for the grant and an allocation ($226 million) listed in Budget documents. Imbert said he had previously debunked such concerns.

This story was originally published with the title "MP: Hundreds in San Juan got no covid19 aid" and has been adjusted to include additional details. See original post below.

BARATARIA/SAN JUAN MP Saddam Hosein said hundreds of his constituents had received no Salary Relief Grant, which was offered during last year's lockdown aimed at curbing the covid19 pandemic.

He was addressing a UNC virtual briefing on Wednesday.

While government ministers have repeated presented figures to argue many people have got grants, Newsday asked the UNC line-up (which included Couva North MP Ravi Ratiram and Chaguanas Mayor Faaiq Mohammed) if the Government's claims matched their own anecdotal experiences with their constituents.

Hosein said the UNC had raised this issue in the last budget debate.

"In the Standing Finance Committee I had raised several issues with respect to the Salary Relief Grant and the distribution of same, and also MP Davendranath Tancoo of Oropouche West, where we questioned there was an unaccounted over $90 million with respect to the Salary Relief Grant, which the Minister of Finance has yet to answer."

Hosein said the UNC had publicly asked members of the public if they had applied for this grant and whether they had received it or not.

"In under 24 hours we got about 3,000 responses where persons have indicated that they have yet to still receive the Salary Relief Grant.

"We must remember the policy of the Government at that time was that there was some level of urgency to provide persons with grants simply because they were off jobs for about three months.

"A year has passed and some of those persons have not got that grant and yet the Government comes with the exact same promise again this year with Salary Relief Grants."

He said he could offer anecdotal evidence that in his constituency hundreds of people had applied for the Salary Relief Grant, in addition to the Rental Assistance Grant, but had yet to receive a cent.

"That is something the Government continues to do, in terms of deny persons...state resources." He said there were "heavy" criteria for people to access the grants.

He said Opposition Leader Kamla Persad-Bissessar, at last Monday's UNC Virtual Report, said individuals have difficulty accessing the grant application forms online.

Newsday was unable to contact Finance Minister Colm Imbert for a response. He was due to hold a briefing on Friday.