ON THE MONEY
PETER ATTARD MONTALTO: Even the Treasury will admit this was not an optimal budget
It has slightly lowered the dangers around debt and balanced the risks with a buffer against future shocks, but we didn’t get answers to fundamental questions
28 February 2021 - 17:15
This was a great budget. It managed to cut weekly bond auctions in the next fiscal year from R6.6bn to around R5.3bn while shifting the political gravity by maintaining three years of nominal wage freezes and cuts in grants in real terms.
What an odd budget. One that couldn’t spend R4bn extra to deliver inflation cover to recipients of grants at a time when food inflation is starting to climb sharply. A budget that admits in its own review that the education spend is “expected to negatively affect learning outcomes”, and couldn’t even mention anything about the Eskom elephant in the room...
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