THE hearing to determine whether a conservatory order should be granted to stay Government’s spending will continue on Monday when attorney for the Leader of the Opposition, Basil Williams is expected to present his rebuttal. As the hearing continued yesterday before acting Chief Justice, Ian Chang, attorney for the Speaker of the National Assembly, Khemraj Ramjattan presented his submission.

Efforts by the media to solicit a comment from Ramjattan on the aims of his submission was ignored. However, Attorney General, Anil Nandlall who is appearing for the Finance Minister said that the Ramjattan’s submission dealt mainly with spending in 2014, while the issuing of the conservatory order applied for by the Leader of the Opposition is intended to affect spending for a period that has already past.

Ramjattan is the last attorney to make his presentation before the Chief Justice in this matter. Justice Chang has already heard from Basil Williams representing the Leader of the Opposition, Ashton Chase and Anil Nandlall who are representing the Attorney General and Finance Minister respectively who are named defendants along with the Speaker of the National Assembly.
The Attorney General said that he has shown that the substantive matter before the court is the legal challenge and therefore the conservatory order will be useless as it addresses spending for 2014 while the year 2015 has already commenced. He further said that the spending for 2015 cannot be affected as the constitution already addresses that issue.
Leader of the Opposition, David Granger through his attorneys, in November 2014, mounted a legal challenge against the Government’s spending on programmes disapproved in the 2014 budget. The challenge was filed following the submission of Statements of Excess for the approval of the National Assembly. The Statements of Excess presented by Finance Minister, Ashni Singh sought Parliamentary approval for spending not catered for in the Budget and was presented before the tenth Parliament went into recess in August 2014.
The Attorney General in his earlier submission to the acting Chief Justice justifying the actions of the Finance Minister said that the action taken by the Finance Minister in 2014 was no different to the action taken in 2012 and 2013 when he was faced with a similar situation. On the two previous occasions the National Assembly had granted approval for the spending.

(By Raymon Cummings)