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KINGSTON — Cabinet has approved an amendment to the General Consumption Tax (GCT) Act, to provide for the re-introduction of a Special Consumption Tax (SCT) on energy drinks. Minister with responsibility for Information, Telecommunications and Special Projects, Hon. Daryl Vaz, told Wednesday's (September 14) Post- Cabinet press briefing at Jamaica House, that the new definition of energy drinks will be...

KINGSTON — Jamaica’s Prime Minister, the Hon Bruce Golding, has joined other top level CARICOM leaders in putting forward proposals to address the current state of West Indies cricket. Mr. Golding is in Trinidad and Tobago attending the Seventeenth Meeting of the Prime Ministerial Sub-Committee on Cricket (PMSC). According to the Office of the Prime Minister (OPM), Mr. Golding held critical and...

KINGSTON — The Ministry of Labour and Social Security (MLSS) and the Registrar General's Department (RGD) have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) establishing the Civil Registration Initiative to assist Programme for Advancement Through Health and Education (PATH) householders to be documented. Labour and Social Security Minister, Hon. Pearnel Charles, speaking at the signing at the Courtleigh Hotel, New Kingston,...

KINGSTON — Jamaica's trade unions have re-affirmed their commitment to supporting the Government's public sector transformation programme to create a cost-effective and efficient public service that is capable of fulfilling economic and social development goals. "We support reform or transformation initiatives, which are aimed at developing and delivering quality public services, making them more relevant to the needs of the...

KINGSTON — At least 100 inner city youths, aged 16-29 years old, stand a chance of being inserted into the job market as micro-franchises, under a Private Sector Organization of Jamaica (PSOJ)/ Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) programme for at risk youths. Dubbed "Microfranchise as Tool for Economic Promotion of Youth at Risk’, the programme, which costs just under US$300,000, aims...

KINGSTON — Chief Executive Officer of the Public Sector Transformation Unit (PSTU), Patricia Sinclair-McCalla, is advocating developing more Government properties across the island. She says that this would reduce the high sums being paid to rent office space for various ministries, departments and agencies. Her call comes against the background of the state of disrepair into which many Government-owned properties...

MONTEGO BAY — Mayor of Montego Bay, Councillor Charles Sinclair has encouraged residents of St. James to pay their property taxes now, in light of a recent survey which showed that there is a low compliance rate in the parish. Addressing a recent Mayor's forum at the Flanker Primary and Junior High School, Mayor Sinclair said that, "the findings of...

KINGSTON — Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the Public Sector Transformation Unit (PSTU) in the Office of the Prime Minister (OPM), Patricia Sinclair-McCalla, says there is need to reform the public sector pension scheme. She stated that the pension facility, in its current non-contributory format, is unsustainable. Speaking on the final day of the Public Sector Monitoring Committee's (PSMC) two-day...

KINGSTON — Prime Minister, the Hon. Bruce Golding said that even as the public sector tightened its expenses, it must also be the instrument for growth stimulation. Noting that Government was the biggest business in the country, the Prime Minister said that the country cannot perform well unless its biggest business also performs well.  Mr. Golding was addressing executives of...

A sum of $174 million, which has been added to the 2011/12 budget, should be enough to complete the 2011 Population and Housing Census this month, as targeted. After STATIN's Director-General, Sonia Jackson, explained that the agency had met a July 31 deadline to complete the field work, but needed to do some “mopping up”, census takers were sent out...

KINGSTON — Minister of Housing, Environment and Water, Hon. Dr. Horace Chang, says progress has been made in the issuing of registered titles to persons, since the passage of the Registration of Titles, Cadastral Mapping and Tenure Clarification (Special Provisions) Act in 2005. “Of the 3,023 registered titles issued as at August 29, 2011, some 2,987 are for first title...

KINGSTON — Some 6,000 children under five years old, from impoverished rural communities, are to be provided with free birth certificates through several registration fairs across the island. This birth certification initiative, which is to begin this month and continue into October,  results from a partnership between the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) and the Registrar General's Department (RGD), with...