Democrat Party pledges to stimulate economy with 1-trillion-baht spending plan
The Democrat Party on Monday announced plans to spend up to 1 trillion baht to revive the economy by implementing 16 economic policies if it wins administrative power.
The Democrat economic team held a press conference at the party’s head office to announce a comprehensive pre-poll economic policy that the party said would be financed by a 1-trillion-baht budget.
The press conference was chaired by Pisit Leeahtam, former deputy finance minister and chairman of the Democrat policy committee. Other members of the economic team, including Kiart Sitthi-amorn, former chairman of the Thai trade representative committee, Dr Samart Ratchapolsitte, former deputy Bangkok governor, and MR Sasipruen Janthat, former CEO of Bank of Ayutthaya, also attended the conference.
Pisit told media that the party would tap unused funds of several government agencies to finance its 16 economic policies aimed at stimulating the economy without the need to borrow more.
The 16 measures in the stimulus package would boost economic growth to 5% per annum and would narrow the income gap of the people as well as lower household debt for a sustainable economy, Pisit claimed.
- Spend 180 billion baht to set up village and community banks with 2 million baht starting fund each.
- Allocate 100 billion baht for government officials to use the government pension fund in advance, and allocate 200 billion baht to allow private firms’ employees to spend their savings in provident funds in advance. Government officials and private employees would be allowed to withdraw from their fund to buy houses or repay housing loans.
- Allocate 300 billion baht for small and medium-sized enterprises and startups so that they would have money for investments.
Long-term measures would be aimed at restructuring the economy and for unlocking the manufacturing potential of the country, he said.
The proposed long-term measures include:
- Issuing land deeds covering 1 million plots of farmland to landless framers within four years
- Grant landless farmer the right to use state land
- Provide 3-million-baht support to each group of farmers by joining their farmlands to clusters to raise bargaining power.
- Ease fishery restrictions under the rules of the Illegal, Unreported and Unregulated (IUU) fishing agreement, although the country would still be under the IUU agreement
- Allow workers to continue their studies for free until they get a bachelor’s degree. Scholarships will be granted in accordance with the market’s demands.
- Provide 1 million free Internet access points.
- Guaranteeing prices of five main crops
- Providing monthly subsidies to farmers at 30,000 baht per household, based on each having 15 rai [2.4 hectares] of farmland
- Offer 100,000-baht subsidy to each group of local fishermen a year
- Buy milk from milk cow raisers for making pasteurised milk to hand out to students for free.
- Each club of elderly people will get financial support of 30,000 baht per year
- Provide free healthcare to all Thais.
Pisit said a Democrat government would need about 220 billon baht to implement the six measures that would narrow the income gap.
The Covid-19 pandemic had cost the country about 3 trillion baht in lost income, he said.
The current government has taken steps to deal with the loss of income by spending 1.5 trillion baht to carry out Covid rehabilitation measures and through the automatic stabiliser method, or collecting 500 billion baht lower than the projected revenue.
He said the country still needed injection of 1 trillion baht to fill the revenue hole left by the Covid pandemic. The Democrat stimulus package would provide the needed 1 trillion baht, he added
“Our GDP has gone down, below the pre-Covid level. Thailand must do something to get out of this slump. So, a Democrat government would inject 1 trillion baht into the economy to boost GDP to grow more than 5%,” Pisit said.
There is already 800 billion baht in the financial system of the government waiting to be spent. A Democrat government would manage to find 200 billion baht more by restructuring the budget and by collecting more revenue and earning non-budget income.
