ISLAMABAD, June 11: Parliamentarians from mainstream political parties have expressed concern over what they called ambiguities of the budget 2007-08, and rejected government’s claim that the budget was pro-poor.

They were expressing their views at a briefing arranged by Strengthening Democracy through Parliamentary Development (SDPD) Project, a joint initiative of parliament, UNDP and the Inter- Parliamentary Union (IPU).

They said the government had raised the hope of low grade government employees but the increase in their salary was a peanut.

They suggested that the government and the opposition should sit together and agree upon the basic minimum common ground of pro-poor benchmarks through the budgetary initiatives.

Parliamentarians from Pakistan Muslim League (Q), PML (N), Pakistan Peoples Party Parliamentarians, MMA, and MQM participated in the session.

However, giving a presentation on the budget, eminent economist Dr A. R. Kamal said it was definitely a better document than the previous budgets of the present government. However, it did not carry features that make a budget specifically pro-poor.

He said the increase in development expenditure was expected to result in bringing down the cost of doing business and augmenting investments. He opined that competitiveness was absolutely essential and private sector and government could jointly improve competitiveness. In that regard, he supported the skill development programmes which would ensure increase in productivity. By the same token, he referred to allocations to the agriculture sector, which rose by 40 percent, and said the prospects of a long-run growth in the sector had increased.

Referring to the general over-expectation of human resource benefits as a result of the budget, he said the real picture of human resource development would emerge after the provincial budgets were announced, as HR outcomes resulted from provincial, not federal activities.

Dr Kamal appreciated government’s initiatives to encourage micro, small and medium enterprises which in his view could generate five times more employment than the large, capital intensive enterprises.

Talking about subsidies for the poor, he said its success depended on their implementation, and general subsidies had a problem of how to reach the poorest of the poor.

Giving an example, he said the relief to the poor through utility stores could only have universal impact if all the poor had access to them. Since utility stores did not exist in the far-flung and rural areas, they would not translate relief to everyone.