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Caribbean & Central America - June 2016 (ISSN 1741-4458)

St Lucia votes for relief from “merciless and choking taxation”

In the 1997 St Lucia general election, a 15-year period of United Workers’ Party (UWP) dominance was brought to an end by the St Lucia Labour Party (SLP) in a 16-1 landslide. Although soundly beaten again in 2001 (by 14 seats to 3), the UWP returned to power in 2006 with a majority of 11-6, and it seemed to be set fair for another prolonged spell in power. That prospect was dealt a fatal blow by the 2008/09 global financial crisis, from which St Lucia had failed to recover sufficiently by the time of the 2011 general election, which was won by the SLP with an 11-6 majority. Ahead of this month’s general election, held on 6 June, the polls suggested the SLP would gain a second consecutive term, but in the event it was the UWP that emerged triumphant, once more with the seemingly inevitable 11-6 margin. The SLP will be ruing the fact that it has lost the electorate’s support just when the economy is showing signs of recovery, and it must fear that it now faces the prospect of another long period of UWP hegemony. But the UWP’s prospects are not unclouded. The world economic outlook is hardly robust, and it has made some expansive promises in its election manifesto that seem to be incompatible with the continuing fiscal responsibility that organisations such as the International Monetary Fund (IMF) are demanding.

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