The spotlight is today (Tuesday) falling on the island’s Treasury Minister Alfred Cannan as he prepared to present his fourth Budget in Tynwald

The MHK for Ayre and Michael has been putting the finishing touches to the financial blueprint for the year ahead.

At the centre of the Budget will be the document known as the Pink Book. It is always a weighty piece of work usually comprising well over 100 pages and it sets out how the island’s finances are going to look for the 12 months ahead.

Many island folk will naturally be wondering whether they will have more money in their pockets as a result of Mr Cannan’s Budget.

Mr Cannan and members of the Treasury team have been beavering away over a ’significant amount of detail’ for a number of months.

The team includes political members, namely Bill Shimmins, MHK for Middle, who has responsibility for the general registry, investment management, asset management and the audit (consultative) committee. Douglas North MHK Ralph Peake has responsibility for social security and customs and Excise.

And Bill Henderson MLC has responsibility for the finance division and currency management.

In addition there is the team led by Caldric Randall who was appointed as the chief financial officer at the Isle of Man Government just over a year ago.

This time last year Mr Cannan set out what he called a Budget of confidence in the Manx economy.

In 2019 he warned against complacency, pointing out that the island faced risks ahead - not least in the shape of Brexit uncertainty.

Since then of course, in the words of UK prime minister Boris Johnson, ’Brexit has been done’ on January 31. But there is now a transitional year ahead in which trade deals and the like are forged.

Last year Mr Cannan highlighted a package of measures designed to support working families, to target further job growth, to invest in infrastructure and to strengthen frontline public services, with a particular focus on policing and healthcare.

At the time, while acknowledging the ongoing uncertainty around Brexit, Mr Cannan said: ’We have solid foundations on which we can adapt to meet our challenges.

’In a year that promises international political and economic turbulence, this Budget provides a platform for confidence in our island and the future.’

The way the Treasury team announces the Budget has been criticised in some quarters and the Speaker of the House of Keys, Juan Watterson says Treasury’s ’monopoly’ over the public purse is a system designed 150 years ago to put maximum distance between elected MHKs and the distribution of taxpayers’ money.