Committee approves $29.9m for CAST

THE Standing Finance Committee has approved a $29,925,500 allocation in the 2024/2025 budget for the Central Administrative Services Tobago (CAST).

The approval was done at a meeting on October 16 at the House of Representatives, Port of Spain.

Before this allocation was approved, Minister in the Office of the Prime Minister (OPM) Ayanna Webster-Roy said CAST "serves as the nexus for the different arms of central government services to the island of Tobago."

She added CAST has core values of accountability, transparency, empathy, integrity, diversity and confidentiality.

"The operations at CAST are driven by its vision to be an innovative service organisation coupled by a highly competent work force, facilitating the sustainable development of Tobago.

In the last fiscal year, Webster-Roy said, "CAST implemented an enterprise, content management system to facilitate the transfer of paper-based files to a modern and user-friendly digital filing system."

A sum of $700,000 was spent in this exercise.

She added, "As we transfer to the next fiscal (year), we reflect on the noteworthy achievements of the last financial period."

Webster-Roy said CAST was confident about similar achievements in fiscal 2025.

CAST is a department under the OPM which plays a critical role in Tobago "ensuring that essential administrative, legal and meteorological services are available on the island and is responsible for supporting all central government agencies in Tobago."

The Registrar-General's office (Tobago) and the Meteorological Services Division (Tobago) are among the entities which fall under CAST's purview.

Earlier in the meeting, the committee approved a budgetary allocation of $2,580,755,600 for the Tobago House of Assembly (THA).

The committee will hold its final meeting on the budget on October 17 from 1.30 pm.

At the end of this meeting, the House will vote on the budget.

The Senate begins its budget debate on October 21.