The government has paid out 16,254 Salary Relief Grants in 2021 so far at a cost of $44.2 million.

This is according to Finance Minister Colm Imbert, who says the figure represents 67% of all applications received for the year.

“Further, in August, we adjusted the qualifying date for 2021 SRGs to April 29, 2021,” he posted to his Twitter account on Friday.

Back in September, Minister Imbert told the House of Representatives that the rollout of the grants were stunted by applicant providing misisng information or misrepresenting information. 

“There was a particular individual in my own constituency who applied for a grant and was unsuccessful. And I had to indicate to the person, they left out the NIS information of their employer and other details as it relates to their employer. It took quite a long time for that information to be submitted. So in many cases, the date on which a payment is made is dependent on the persons providing the necessary information,” Imbert told the Lower House on September 16th.

Other cases, the Minister said at the time, were due to applicants misrepresenting information, such as the date of their termination. 

“The processing of these applications is quite a comprehensive process… The Salary Relief Grant Unit at the Ministry of Finance is making personal phone calls to every single one of those persons o ensure that they are given another opportunity to provide the missing information- so they can get the grant from this caring PNM government,” Imbert said.