Constituency funds

The Minister of Finance Tevita Lavemaau has revealed the $1,260,000 package to support the community saying it was an excellent move by the government.

According to Kaniva News, Speaker Lord Fakafanua has described the funding as a “new initiative” and said this was part of a budget allocation the government had submitted to Parliament for approval.

Within the budget an additional TP$306,000 funding has been allocated for the 17 people’s MPs to pay their office staff. This gave each of the MPs another TP$18,000 each, the Speaker said.

Kaniva News reported the funding was designed for the 17 elected People's Representatives to distribute among their constituencies for the development of their communities.

This year each People's MP is distributing over $88,000 to their constituencies.

The nobles want to have the same funding.

The noble MPs have already had $88,000 allocated to build a parliamentary office for them and another $176,000 was added to include a salary for an administrator to run the office.