The former One Bermuda Alliance administration was accused in the Budget speech of an attempt to “cut its way out of a recession”.

David Burt, Premier and Minister of Finance, blamed the Opposition party’s programme of austerity for “mouldy schools, unreliable public services and crumbling infrastructure” in his first Budget statement.

The OBA hit back by saying it had pulled the island back from “economic disaster” after it inherited “a bloated budget, thousands of jobless, and unsafe neighbourhoods” from the last Progressive Labour Party government.

OBA senator Justin Mathias said the Opposition’s Reply to the Budget would “set out a realistic fiscal plan for Bermuda and not just aspirational dialogue with no specifics or defined pathway of execution”.

Mr Burt told Parliament that the option to “simply borrow more money” equated to “living on borrowed time”.

Mr Mathias said that was “the situation the Bermudian public were left with in 2012 from the Progressive Labour Party’s mismanagement of our economy and underscores their tenure in government”.