Hartley Henry - DLP Political Strategist
Prime Minister Thompson said something in passing over the weekend that I think should not be allowed to pass. It is that for a country that did so well, financially speaking, in the late 1990s and first seven years of the 21st century, Barbados should not have so huge a backlog of persons relying on State regulated social services.
24, 000 persons on the waiting list of the National Housing Corporation is scandalous, especially when one considers the hundreds of millions of dollars there were spent on dubious public sector projects during the so called ‘glory years’. Think about it! Do you realize the number of homes that could have been built and the number of affordably priced house lots that could have been carved out from the near $300 million that was pumped, or some may say dumped, into the Greenland Landfill?
Why should the list of elderly folks applying for help from the National Assistance Board be exceeding the 10, 000 mark, when during the period of their wait, this country had in excess of $300 million to spend on a bunch of run down hotels that to this day has provided absolutely no return on investment? We couldn’t afford to take care of our elderly, but we could have found money to enrich a couple of party affiliates.
Why should old persons be waiting for 15 years for help in installing an indoor toilet or repairing a roof over their heads, when we were at the same time in a financial position to give an open, signed cheque to the developers of the new Kensington Oval? Hundreds of millions of dollars was pumped into that facility at a time when the number of persons seeking Home Care Assistance was climbing. It was also at a time when victims of spousal abuse and children of sexual and other physical abuse had no safe haven.
Something was fundamentally wrong with the direction this country was headed when, for the almighty dollar, we were prepared to compromise and jeopardize our water table by recklessly tinkering with water restriction zones. Tonight a person went to sleep living in a zone two water restriction area and by tomorrow morning, they were living in zone three, because someone with deep pockets wanted to build a monstrosity next to them.
Also, that the advice of town planners could have been overruled in favor of setting down unsightly developments along our west coast is an eternal shame to those responsible. How could we have been so callous with the legacy we bequeath to future generations? Don’t tell anyone, but I personally find our current west coast very unappealing to the eye.
Indeed, I hardly drive visiting friends along that route. Those responsible for blocking views to the ocean and for imposing some of those towering structures shall remain damned and condemned, in my consideration, for a very long time.
But getting back to this issue of a false sense of development and prosperity, did we really need a $700 million prison? We are scrambling now to find the money to refurbish or build a national hospital, but we didn’t bash an eyelid when money was plentiful, in commissioning a near one billion dollar jail. Can you imagine the type of hospital facility that we could have had for half that money?
And yet today we are quarrelling about eight million dollars being spent on free bus rides for school children and two million dollars going to holiday camps for the same children. Is anyone aware of the hundreds of millions of dollars that were spent on vehicles and equipment for agencies such as the Transport Board, Water Authority, Sanitation Service, Public Works Department and the said Greenland Landfill? Check and see what neighboring islands paid for this said equipment and vehicles from the same suppliers during that period.
This government can today buy fire trucks for 60 per cent of what was paid for similar vehicles from the same suppliers; meeting the same specifications, 10 years ago. The price that Barbados is paying today is the same price that is being quoted sister Caribbean countries. The question is why were we paying 40 per cent more than other countries for these said vehicles not too long ago?
People in Barbados who are hurting today must understand why they are hurting. If you have applied to the National Housing Corporation for a house and you cannot get one, in spite of the hundreds being built, it is because there is this huge backlog that was not attended to in times of plenty.
If your grandparents cannot get prompt assistance from the Urban or Rural Development Commissions, it is because there are thousands of persons before them who have been waiting for years for relief, but who were overlooked because of the number of phantom houses that were built in that dispensation.
The Prime Minister is right! This is not fair and it is not just…but, it is real.
Scores of road contracts were awarded companies that existed only in name and they were some individuals who received contracts to build roads and repair bridges that had not the slightest concept of how such should have been done. The result today is a plethora of unfinished projects in rural Barbados, for which monies have been paid in full but which will now have to be completed by this administration.
Some persons do not like us to talk about these things, but we have to, especially when a poor family walks into the office of a department of government and you essentially have to turn them away empty handed because you simply do not have the resources to attend to their needs.
The monies that this country now has to look for to settle the Al Barrack building controversy, the hundreds of millions that will be required to settle the 3S highway fiasco, the $700 million that has to be secured over time to pay for a prison and the $750 million in cost overruns that could have been avoided, all leave a consequence of pain and unnecessary suffering for ordinary Barbadians who had a right to sit and sup at the table of opportunity.
Persons don’t wish us to talk about these things because they would rather we forget them and look to the future. But tell that to the long list of persons standing in line at the doors of several social agencies waiting for a little relief. Tell that to the battered wife or the physically abused child who has no safe haven. Tell that to the old lady who fell last night while walking across the yard to use the pit toilet.
Those who are responsible for overlooking the plight and the needs of these categories of persons, in times of plenty, stand condemned and must not be forgiven or easily forgotten.
Barbados Underground 
“Scores of road contracts were awarded companies that existed only in name and they were some individuals who received contracts to build roads and repair bridges that had not the slightest concept of how such should have been done. The result today is a plethora of unfinished projects in rural Barbados, for which monies have been paid in full but which will now have to be completed by this administration.”
Now here, surely, is an area where we can move from the realm of innuendo and allegation to the safety of evidence and fact. If you are a government and you sign a contract with Mr. X for the building of a bridge at Y place and pay the full amount of the contract, stupid though that may be, and Mr X does not complete the bridge, he is in breach of the contract and you have recourse in law. Take Mr. X to court. You have the cancelled cheques. Recover the money paid to Mr. X. Use it to complete the bridge. That’s really simple, isn’t it? Why after two years has it not been done? And why are you still complaining?
And who awarded the contract? Was it done in accordance with the rules? And if the rules were broken, is anyone accountable? Or will it be just another item in the Auditor General’s report? more grist for the politicians’ mill?
I’d like some answers, not just more slurs on the previous administration. would anyone else? In fact, in our supposed democracy, I am entitled to answers. Or does the author’s commitment not extend that far?
So, Mr. Henry, can you now spell out for us here just what you and your friends in government intend to do to correct these alleged abuses of the taxpayers funds? Instead of whining and complaining of this, that and the next about the former administration why don’t you guys do something constructive? Do we still have a police investigative body? Do we still have magistrates and judges? What I am trying to say is this, if this is the case (cases?) and you have evidence of these abuses by the former administration then why don’t you hand it over to the Commissioner of Police /Director of Prosecutions for their action? If on the other hand you have no evidence then why don’t you et al just shut up and get on with doing the people’s business (for which you are being VERY well paid). After all it’s been now two and a half years of DLP administration and all we can hear is this whining and complaining day after day from the Prime Minister back to the ordinary party member! Just when do you people intend to start really governing this country? A few days before the next General Elections are due? Just get to work and do what you are handsomely remunerated to do, that is governing Barbados!!
24, 000 persons on the waiting list of the National Housing Corporation is scandalous,
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I am sick with all the constant talk of 24,000 people signed up for houses. I will bet you that only a third if so much can qualify for a house. The next thing is the NHC updating this list. My wife and I signed up separately for a house way back in 1981 and I am positive that our names are still on the list. How many people signed up back then, how many did, how many obtain homes already and then you can ask yourself if those figures match up.
So my friends, this list of 24,000 is bocus and we must stop fooling people. I am waiting on WIV to comment.
Tell me Why // April 15, 2010 at 9:45 PM
24, 000 persons on the waiting list of the National Housing Corporation is scandalous.
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Actually, given the poor record of the BLP gov’t between 1994 & 2007, the true list of persons waiting on houses was really 44,000.
The tremendous efforts of the DLP between April 2008 – March 7th 2010……has made a significant dent on those numbers.
Then again that is why, the Barbadian electorate placed this fabulous DLP party in office at the ratio 21 – 9 .
Thank you Hammie La……..it is CENSUS time…..every vote counts !
NOW TELL ME WHY, I should not be elated ?
Does the Government consider the houses at Coverley as among the housing solutions for people in need of housing, (as this category of person is popularly understood). These houses are selling at prices in excess of $289, 000 for two bedroom house and $333, 000 for a 3 bedroom house. Those interested go to :
http://villagesatcoverley.net/residences.html
If someone can afford to spend $289 000 for a 660 square foot, 2 bedroom house, I would question if that person could be termed “in need”. Three years ago, NHC, was offering houses of similar size and design but built out of timber at a fraction of the prices for Coverley and very few people took up the offer.
There is no doubt on the basis of comment on the ground, on BU and other areas that Barbadians are becoming more impatience at the strategy by the government to continually blame the former government for overspend, corruption etc. The government needs to step up by delivering on their election promise to root out corruption makers in the former government or shut up.
Remember these housiing promises from the 2008 DLP manifesto. Tell us how many of them have been implemented.
In the first 100 days of the new DLP administration remove VAT from building materials on houses valued up to $400,000.
Establish a Home Ownership Revolving Fund for public sector workers, providing interest free loans to appointed public servants with 5 years service who are first time homeowners. This fund will be capitalized with an initial injection of $40 million.
Provide 500 lots of land in five (5) months at $5 per sq foot for first time homeowners. These lots have been identified and land will be acquired by private treaty where necessary to speed up the process.
Provide 2,500 house spots for sale to low and middle income wage earners in the first term of a DLP government.
Commit to building 2,000 housing solutions per year in the first term of a DLP government. These will include rental units, terrace units and starter homes.
Increase the tax deduction for mortgages to $20,000.00 per year.
Commit to building and maintaining a pool of rent-to-purchase units for low-income earners, pensioners, and the disabled who may not qualify for mortgages and loans.
Commit to realizing the concept of Housing Communities, for low income earners in which all the amenities – social, recreational and commercial are provided e.g. day nursery, play area, laundry,mini-mart.
Promote the concept of starter home projects and partner with private sector companies (through tax incentives) in promoting the concept of “build and live”, a long tradition in Barbados.
Explore the concept of reverse mortgages with the financial institutions and give incentives where necessary, to provide for dignified standards of living for our elderly in their golden years.
Especially when the government comes with a campaign of deliberate mis-information re the cost of construction of Dodds, implying massive overruns.
The LOTO refutes the allegation with facts, (which obviously are available to the government). The project came in under budget and the government split the difference with the contractor, netting Barbados a near $4million bonus. Somebody or some people have egg all over their faces, but of course will brazen out their attempt at rabble rousing.
Not least Tony Marshall, who put in a telling performance on Brass Tacks yesterday. After melo-dramatizing and raising general alarm over the cost of the prison, he was left stuttering by (Henderson Bovell?) who called in and set the record straight. Marshall made every attempt to derail, confuse and obfuscate Bovell’s submission and eventually ran away in ignominy from the truth.
The man, whose hallmark on the call in program, is “ascertaining facts, in the interest of the listening public” failed miserably in being objective, allowing callers prior to Bovell, especially the taxi driver, to rant with allegations Marshall knew to be untrue. He made no attempt to bring balance to the handling of the subject.
He can no longer claim impartiality or objectivity. The color of his political underpants is clear for all to see.
The Governor of the Central Bank produces a report on the performance of the economy for the first quarter and fails to mention that Barbados suffered a sixth consecutive quarter of negative growth. We had to get that information from the LOTO. Is this the level of performance we are to expect from the Governor?
Barbadians should be very concerned by what appears to be a concerted effort by the Government and its “creature” to withhold or disguise relevant financial information.
Chairman Marshall appears to have become even more strident since his appointment to the NIB Board. His manipulation of the microphone when he wants to jettison a caller makes a mockery of the role of the producer.
The fall back position seems to be the future cost of the prison which is what BU has always understood the propaganda to mean.
HH
If the prison has cost us $700 million then tell us how much each capital item that the government has financed by debt has cost us. Don’t be selective in the assets you choose. You may not be as unfortunate as most of us are in having to acquire a car using a finance lease. We can tell you that the lease payments are way in excess of the car we eventually then have to turn around and purchase.
“Actually, given the poor record of the BLP gov’t between 1994 & 2007, the true list of persons waiting on houses was really 44,000. The tremendous efforts of the DLP between April 2008 – March 7th 2010……has made a significant dent on those numbers.”
Am I the only one alarmed by this statement? Significant dent?
The contributor, Love, is claiming that the Government has reduced the waiting list (i.e persons awaiting homes) by 20,000 and I wish to see the evidence because if true that is a remarkable feat.
You want to know what I would find amusing is that if Mr. Thonmpson and Co. decide to lock up some of these people including HAMMIE LA. Enuff and Co. would be getting on realllll stink on the blogs.
I am going to keep on asking this question:
WHEN WILL SOMEONE BE LOCKED UP?!!!!!!!!
Does anything come at a price without interest?
Perhaps the esteemed banker Marshall can illucidate from a banker’s position how loans work for the benefit of all Barbadians. Everything has a price I suppose. True or False. Going ,going, gone.
DLP Column : Thirty million reasons
The Barbados Labour Party has outdone itself in committing future generations of Barbadians to a massive debt. The challenge of building a prison after gross neglect of the former Station Hill plant smacks of seeking to throw money behind problems. We continue to reap the political sorrows of the bad decision making that took place under the Arthur
administration.
The former administration is claiming that it took the money and utilised it in ways that have left physical evidence of their policy agenda. They have on record spent over $50 million on the plant at the Coast Guard; another $130 million on a fiasco office building in Warrens; $100 million on the 3S Highway; nearly $100 million on the Harrison’s Cave project; $1 million on the Golden shower in Sliver Sands; over $100 million spent on the Gems Hotels; another $100 million on the Halls of Justice Building ; $150 million on the Oval; and $30 million on a floating hotel. These were some of the priorities of their time.
What the Opposition failed to tell the public was that this legacy-building strategy came with a price tag of over $750 million in cost overruns as testimony to the inefficiency of Arthur’s political record of stewardship. SHAME!!!
After this display of financial splurging and total disregard for public needs, the Opposition comes in on a white horse with shouts of saving the country from financial mismanagement of the DLP. What a joke!!! This episode of financial imprudence went on for 14 years unabated until the DLP came to office. We have been able to confirm over the last two years where additional areas of financial havoc were and now the cost overruns have topped the one billion mark. SHAME!!!
The equation that we have before us as a Government is one which has forced us to rethink what we want to achieve as a society. We will be strengthening our social safety net with the stated intention of securing the vulnerable in our society. This agenda, as pursued by the Thompson-led Government, has so far lead to the introduction of free bus rides on public transportation, the enactment of Constituency Councils, hosting of Constituency Conferences, a State-funded national camp programme, State support to the National Council of Parent Teacher’s Association, to name a few. These are now all the subject of severe criticisms by the Opposition. SHAME!!!
Two years have passed and political amnesia has set in among the members sitting on the Opposition benches. We on this side are very much aware of the challenges that confront our small open economy and would wish to assure the public that we have your back. Despite the abuse that took place of the Treasury and the continual abuse of our foreign
exchange by the commitment of $30 million annually to VECO, we will deliver on our social agenda. What we came and found at the National Housing Corporation is a waiting list of over 20 000 persons and a backlog of hundreds of clients at the Rural and Urban Development Commission. Yet the Opposition claims that the
evidence of their stewardship is there for all to see. SHAME!!!
Maybe Arthur should publish for the poor people seeking assistance a recipe on how to convert the concrete at the NHC building in Warrens into a meal for three children and a mother. Mia should tell the grandmother who is diabetic how to convert the grass at the Oval into insulin. These life experiences of our needy continue to define the policy agenda of the DLP as we continue on our Pathways to Progress. Our intention is to improve the quality of life for all in the country.
It is now our wish that the Opposition tells us… what is the real deal with the Prison?
I trust many of you know and are aware of the exact make up of the Jan payment for the prison and exactly what and who the part of US $400,000.00 goes to each year?
@ Annonymous
No true at all, I am all for locking up if there are people to be imprisoned.
I trust many of you know and are aware of the exact make up of the Jan payment for the prison and exactly what and who the part of US $400,000.00 goes to each year?
…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..It seems that you are condoning fraud as per your statement. If the Government is in receipt of money going into someone’s pocket. Why the hell you don’t get the perpetrator behind bars. Maybe, this is the type of partisan propaganda that we are accustomed in hearing from you.
WIV
You have been in parliament long enouigh that you should know that you can find who the money is due to be paid to at the back of the estimates.
I hope so I tuly hope so that is iffffffff they will ever be locked up and we ALLLLLL KNOW that some of these fers want locking up!~
GRAVE CHARGES
Superintendent of Cemeteries Ricky Cummins. (FP)
Published on: 4/16/2010.
by PATRICK WARD
Superintendent of Cemeteries, Emeric Ancil “Ricky” Cummins and his assistant Stephen Niles have been charged with selling grave plots.
The two appeared today in the Holetown Magistrates’ Court on four charges that stretch a ten year span between 1999 and January 2009.
They were granted bail after pleading not guilty to charges of selling graves at St. James Cemetery when they had no authority to do so.
Cummins, 59, of Ridge View, Cane Vale, Christ Church, and Niles, 49, of West Terrace, St. James, appeared before Magistrate Ian Weekes and opted to be tried at the Magistrates’ Court.
Cummins is charged with dishonestly obtaining money from Joel Bannister of Mount Standfast, St. James claiming that he was authorised to sell a double grave at St. James Cemetery on June 11, 1999;
• that on October 27, the same year, he took money from Eric Best of St. Silas Heights, St. James, for a grave at the same cemetery and;
• that on July 23, 2001, he got money from Seymour King of Harmony Circle, Hothersal Turning, St. Michael for a grave at the same cemetery.
He was represented by Roger Forde, QC.
Meantime, Niles who returns to court on October 18 this year, is charged with dishonestly obtaining $1,800 dollars from Marion Rouse with the intent of permanently depriving her by deception, by falsely representing that he was authorised by the Sanitation Service Authority to sell a grave at St. James cemetery, sometime between January 2 and 24 2009.
Both men pleaded not guilty and were released on $3 000 bail each with a surety after prosecutor Sergeant Glenda Carter did not object to them being released.
Cummins returns to court on October 21
Next to follow should be the crook Leo Brewster et al for fraud.
You wanted them and yes they are coming forward and appearing in our Court System now, next up Brewster has taken the example of his former higher ups and only stolen about $ 1.5 million from you and I.
You want them charged and they are being charged one by one, have no fear.
Any ideas where that portion of the figure of US $400,000.00 out of the payment that has to be paid to VECO every year is ending up ?
So Cummins, Niles and Brewster are the people that PM Thompson and others were complaining about during the election campaign? We are implicitly asked to believe that these civil servants (two of whom are heads of departments) committed the alleged offenses on instruction or in collusion with some Minister of Government? Well one of them is alleged to has committed the offense in 2009. So by the implied reasoning of WIV, the DLP may guilty of corruption.
WIV
Don’t bring that crap to us.We want mottley and owen and payne and marshall and glyne clarke,liz etc no low level people like cummins and niles.
The people are getting real sick of this crap talk by the DLP and no action.
I hope the PM understands that we will not be satisfied with any debate in parliament about the al barack issue and accusing george payne and the blp if they take tax payers dollars to pay al barack and at the end of it all no politician is held accountable.
Enough of that shite.
We want justice,no lotta long talk and this government is NOT delivering on that!
A few thoughts….
From the article quote: “Prime Minister Thompson said something in passing over the weekend that I think should not be allowed to pass. It is that for a country that did so well, financially speaking, in the late 1990s and first seven years of the 21st century, Barbados should not have so huge a backlog of persons relying on State regulated social services….”
Response: In the late 90’s through the last election … Barbados looked great on the financial balance sheet with the elites happy as hell. Unfortunately the national balance sheet does not adquately reflect life in the average bajan household.
From the article: “But getting back to this issue of a false sense of development and prosperity, did we really need a $700 million prison? …”
Response: I suspect that if the elites continue to be successful at maintaining their grip on our nation economically, they will need somewhere to put people, if or when all hell breaks loose.
“Some persons do not like us to talk about these things, but we have to, especially when a poor family walks into the office of a department of government and you essentially have to turn them away empty handed because you simply do not have the resources to attend to their needs.”
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You know it’s not so much that people do not like to hear these things as it is they are TIRED hearing of these things. How long has it been 4 years+ now if you count the years leading up to the election? The honeymoon is long over and no criminal charges are being brought, yet the DLP and it’s mouthpieces like you continue to sing hymn a tonne about the failings and cost overruns of the previous administration.
Just leaf through the Auditor General’s report, pick a ministry and call the DPP, there are loads of options if you even just wanted to put on a public showing of action. In fact, go get the CZMU guy, what’s become of that?
I’m one several lettered youths who have little interest in this crap you put out on behalf of your boss to keep the fowls clucking. The elections will soon be upon us. We made you. We will break you. We have zero interest in the fantastic stories of corruption. We want facts, an action plan, and execution.
LOCK UP SOMEBODY OR STFU.
thanks.
@ A Discerning Youth
Actually, it’s money & power that will make or break people. the electorate may remove the figureheads, but they still won’t get what they want…unless you play the ELITE ARENA game!
For every puppet that is replaced, 2 more will spring up. You gotta beat them at their own game if you want ANY chance of justice. Learn them, play them & beat them. But NEVER become them. That way, you gain respect.
I was once told “The masses are as***s ” and the politician knows that. They already figure out that the people forgets all the election promises and that people are too busy with their personnal lives to chasethem. However once in a while the politicians would throw the public a bone as a measure of goodwill . For example recently all the politicians have been talking about the musicians taking responsibilty for the type of music. However that is all well and good expect the same yard stick they are using to measure others should also be applied to them.
Question : Is the public so unware that such issues even though necessary is only an attempt to divert attention from the real issues that confront the country?
Really smoke and mirrors.
4 years on and Windbag in Pain is still fighting the election.
Aint yuh got no faith in yur own government man?
No use whining about the prison like a two year old whose lost his dummy- you is a big boy now and understands that we need a prison to put the bad boys in and yuh have to pay to git one.
What yuh want them criminals running about the streets killing and robbing?
Like the man said if you pay by finance you pay much more ,money aint cheap you know, aint you worked that out yet?
The fact is that the BLP delivered a prison whacha wanna do give it back?