Xavier-Luc Duval focused his Private Notice Question on the high cost of living and its impact on the population. He listed a series of measures that, according to him, the government should implement. He asked the Minister of Finance if he was going to come forward with these proposals which will obviously bring relief to consumers.
These measures range from reducing some fuel taxes to increasing pensions, providing assistance to families, providing savings bonds that are not subject to cost increases, extending subsidies to other products, and reducing importers’ profit margins on subsidised products.
Renganaden Padayachy talked about the measures taken during the pandemic. He added that the measures proposed by the leader of the opposition will be studied by his ministry. Then, he went back to 2008, when Xavier-Luc Duval was Minister of Finance. Padayachy recalled that the compensation that Mauritians obtained was derisory because they earned little. He explained that the old-age pension was Rs 2,802, that many heads of households did not receive more than Rs 8,000 and that there was no minimum wage.
Xavier-Luc Duval countered that in 2010-2011, when Pravind Jugnauth was Finance Minister, he had given the worst wage compensation in the country’s history, Rs 100.
On the question about fuel taxes
Renganaden Padayachy said that this was what allows the government to come up with subsidies on many products used by the population. Xavier-Luc Duval countered that this was also what allowed many ministers to go to Dubai Expo, the Molnupiravir scandal, and the Gold Coast project, which he described as a white elephant. In the end, the two spoke a different language this morning at the PNQ.
