Travesty! Phillips decries lack of CDF increase
Published:Tuesday | September 20, 2022 | 4:21 PM
Member of Parliament for Manchester North Western, Mikael Phillips, has described as a travesty the allocation of $20 million for the Constituency Development Fund (CDF), a sum similar to the amount he received when first elected in 2012.
In his contribution to the State of the Constituency Debate in Gordon House Tuesday afternoon, Phillips said that a decade later the needs have increased and inflation has risen sharply, by approximately 30 to 40 per cent.
“The only tool we have to respond to the plight and needs of our constituents has not changed for the last ten years, and that is a travesty,” he declared.
The Manchester North Western MP also raised concerns about what he believes is a problem in the distribution of equal resources to urban and rural constituencies.
“Half Way Tree is not a Mile Gully, and Water House is not a Junction. Even though there is a difference in population density in the urban constituencies, rural constituencies, in many instances, are four times the size of urban constituencies. Yes, the needs are different, but agencies respond differently to urban centres than they do to rural or deep rural communities.”
He noted that MPs sometimes received $1 million in drain cleaning allocations twice per year. However, he said the sum could not scratch the surface of the volume of work that should be done in rural constituencies.
He said that de-bushing was one of the most urgent demands being made by constituents especially with the rains in the past few weeks.
“I will say it again and again until someone listens. Rural constituencies cannot be treated in the same way that urban constituencies are treated with de-bushing and drain cleaning. East Central St Andrew cannot be compared to North West Manchester,” he stressed.
He said that the CDF and other allocations should be made based on the size of the constituency and the amount of work to be done.
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