Should the $10K Payment Threshold Be Higher? Minister Perez Says Raise It

Minister of Blue Economy Andre Perez is suggesting the government’s $10,000 payment threshold to process payments may be too low. His comments contrast with Financial Secretary Joseph Waight’s assessment of it on Tuesday.

It is the same threshold that FinSec Waight described as the apparent tool used to dodge Treasury oversight in the ‘Mira Millions’ investigation. He called the payment pattern “suspicious” and suggested there may have been “wilful intention” behind it.

“Either somebody dropped the ball, fell asleep, or worse, they moved together on it,” Waight said. “This case looks cute to me.”

At today’s Fourth Blue Economy Climate Resilience Forum, Perez argued that rising costs across government operations make the current threshold increasingly difficult to work within. “From a business standpoint, ten thousand is low,” Perez said. “If I’m going to be engaging my accounting unit, and payments are getting bigger, the increase of cost on just about everything, then it’s time for us to look at maybe increasing the threshold from ten to fifteen or twenty thousand dollars.”

When pressed on whether the structured payments linked to Minister Oscar Mira’s family constituted abuse of the system, Perez stepped back. “Let the audit department do what they need to do,” he said. “Let’s not get into the realm of speculation.”

In Cabinet’s Tuesday meeting, it confirmed it had accepted Mira’s request for a leave of absence and directed that a comprehensive review of the government’s procurement rules be fast-tracked. The existing Financial Orders date back to 1965 and the Stores Orders to 1968.

“Cabinet discussed and examined the existing Government Procurement Rules and considered that the current process of comprehensively reviewing and updating these Procurement Rules (including the Financial Orders 1965, the Stores Orders 1968), must be fast-tracked. Cabinet therefore directed that the new draft Procurement Rules be submitted for its consideration within the next three months,” the cabinet press briefing stated.