Cuts in allocations for the poor, disabled and senior citizens in Budget 2014 shows disregard for the needy, says Padang Serai MP N Surendran.

Despite "grandly" announcing millions of ringgit in allocations to help this section of society, Surendran said, a comparison with Budget 2013 shows that their sliver of the pie has been reduced even further.

NONEFor example, Surendran (left) said, under socio-economic aid, RM 309.26 million allocated to the disabled next year is a whole RM6 million less compared to 2013.

"With increasing prices and the inflation factor, why reduce economic aid to the disabled? The fact was cleverly and dishonestly hidden by the prime minister when (he made) his announcement (last) Friday," he said in a statement.

Similarly, he said, aid for the poor was "quietly reduced" by RM2.36 million compared with RM272.02 million in 2013.

Senior citizens too will get less, compared with 2013, with the amount allocated for aid down from RM489 million to RM479.71 million in 2014.

As a whole, he pointed out, the total RM1.29 billion allocated for assistance for the poor, disabled and senior citizens only amounted to 0.5 percent of the total budget.

Not a caring government budget

"This is not the Budget of a caring government, and it does not reflect the compassionate nature of Malaysians.

"Pakatan Rakyat demands the allocations be reviewed and increased by the government before being passed by the Dewan Rakyat," added Surendran, who is a PKR vice-president.

Checks with the Budget 2014 speech showed that the allocation for aid to the poor, disabled and senior citizens make up less than half of that allocated for soft loans via the Maritime Development Fund.

The loans, which are to support the shipping and docking industry and maritime-related oil and gas activities, amount to RM3 billion, and have been earmarked by an economist as questionable.

Centre for Policy Initiatives chief economist Lim Teck Ghee also pointed out that the same loans outshadow the RM1.9 billion allocated to affordable housing.

In contrast, the federal welfare aid scheme provides assistance of RM100 to RM300 per month to registered disabled, poor and senior citizens.

The 2014 Budget also sees operating expenditure go up from by RM15.8 billion to RM217.7 billion, while development expenditure is slashed by RM3.2 billion to RM46.5 billion.

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