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A messy sit­u­a­tion. That’s how econ­o­mist Prof Patrick Wat­son de­scribed the near bank­rupt­cy of funds in the Na­tion­al In­sur­ance Board of T&T (NIBTT) that led Fi­nance Min­is­ter Dave Tan­coo to in­crease the con­tri­bu­tion rates by three per cent next Jan­u­ary. In Jan­u­ary 2027, the rates would al­so go up by an­oth­er three per cent for the work­ing class.

Weigh­ing in on the in­crease on Thurs­day, Wat­son said the sit­u­a­tion in NIB was “messy”, stat­ing that he hopes this would serve as a wake-up call to the Gov­ern­ment and NIBTT that this must nev­er hap­pen again.

“We must not reach the stage where you are about to go bank­rupt. The on­ly way to deal with this sit­u­a­tion is to get more mon­ey from some source, and the best source is the cur­rent con­trib­u­tors.”