AS the Government continues to strive to get the country back on a sustainable growth path, Prime Minister Mia Amor Mottley said revising various government fees is likely to occur to assist in raising much-needed revenue.

However, Prime Minister Mottley contended that these fees will not be raised willy-nilly. She was speaking yesterday during the Barbados Chamber of Commerce and Industry’s first business luncheon for the year at the Hilton hotel, which was held under the theme ‘Envisioning 2020: The Path Towards a New Decade’.

“With that, we are still on target because we made decisions to be able to increase our taxes on land, assets and we made some adjustments to one or two other things in last year’s Budget. I believe that we are pretty steady. Some of the fees that we are going to have to deal with ... are fees that have not been touched for 20 years, 30 years, 40 years and it therefore means the delivery of the service is hampered.

If we try to bring the provision of those services back on to the central government, then this country will face continued erosion, and we are not going to do that at any cost,” she told the packed room of business leaders.

She said successive governments were unfortunately unwilling to confront the issue of fees and increase them by any amount. The PM made the point while using bus fares as an example, which she said had not been increased for more than a decade prior to her Government’s decision to do so last year. Mottley’s comments as she noted that having reduced the rates of corporation tax and putting domestic and international business companies in this country on equal footing, Government has collected considerably less revenue in that area, some $40 million and it is imperative that they find ways to meet that shortfall.

In that vein, she made it clear that additional taxation could not be ruled out, but said government was sensitive the condition of households and companies and the impact that increases in respect of taxes or fees could have on Barbadians. To that end, she stated that any steps taken will “not topple the apple cart”.

“I am not going to give any assurance to anyone that there will be no taxes or no increases - what I will say is that whatever increase there is, will be justified on the basis of prudence [and] stability. We are sensitive to the fact that we want to increase disposable income in this country because governments, don’t trade, governments don’t grow on their own; individuals do, companies do and if we tax them out of existence, nobody will grow.”

Additionally, questioned about further layoffs in the public sector, she said government cannot “insulate everybody at all times, for all reasons”, and therefore added that there is only one who could give the assurance that there would be no more layoffs – “the Divine”.

Referring then to the successes achieved under the Barbados Economic Recovery and Transformation (BERT) Plan, Mottley again called on Barbadians to stay the course and stay focused, as she maintained that the road to recovery is not a sprint.

“We knew that it could not be resolved overnight... I need everybody in here now, to help lift some weight and to do the investments,” she added. (JRT)

THE Barbados Government has signalled its commitment to combat the scourge of violence and harassment in the workplace and in the wider world of work, and local employers are being encouraged to do the same.

Minister of Labour and Social Partnership Relations, Colin Jordan, acknowledged the above, as he delivered the feature address during the Barbados Employers’ Confederation “Violence in the Workplace” Seminar, held yesterday at the Courtyard by Marriott Hotel.

“To bolster our efforts to foster sustainable economic growth, we need businesses to be sustainable and competitive and profitable, but this will not be achieved by workers who are affected by workplace violence and harassment. Violence and harassment in the workplace or in the wider world of work has the potential to affect a person’s psychological, physical or sexual health, dignity and family and social environment. We must also be cognisant that violence and harassment can impact productivity. It can actually decrease worker engagement, contribute to a hostile work environment, increase the level of absenteeism and worker turnover, and lead to a poor public image for the employing organisation, in your case, your businesses,” Minister Jordan told those gathered.

“Recognising the link between our workers, our most precious component in our processes and our economic growth and development, we should feel compelled to fervently and actively address any issues that negatively affect them. And I must tell you that it will be a wonderful day when employers, both in the public sector, the private sector and the third sector, take a proactive approach rather than reacting to things like laws and regulations and conventions,” he added.

Jordan further stated, “I’ve taken a special interest in this Convention on Violence and Harassment because this has been an issue which has long plagued our workplaces, often more harassment than violence, but it has plagued our workplaces for a long time and it is now recognised as a health hazard. It is a serious multifaceted problem that affects not only the intended targets, but also colleagues, the entire workforce, it impacts households, it impacts families and therefore, it impacts communities.”

The Labour Minister meanwhile noted that through the introduction of several pieces of labour legislation such as the Employment Sexual Harassment Prevention Act, the Safety and Health at Work Act and the Employment Rights Act, local workplaces have been improved and have been made safer.

He then revealed, “The Ministry has completed work on the Anti-Discrimination Bill, which will speak to the prevention of discrimination in the workplace. This Bill will shortly be submitted to Cabinet for approval, prior to it being laid in Parliament.”

Minister Jordan said that whilst the above-mentioned pieces of legislation touch on aspects of the International Labour Organisation’s (ILO) Violence and Harassment Convention (No. 190), their intent would not have specifically taken into consideration the broader definition of violence and harassment. As such, Government along with employers, workers and the social partners in general, must now engage in discussion to determine whether the provisions of the Convention are best served by amending existing legislation, or by the introduction of new legislation.

THE Queen Elizabeth Hospital yesterday became the first public hospital in the Caribbean where patients can have their corneas diagnosed for free. That is because the island’s main healthcare facility was gifted a Pentacam Tomography machine, which will go a long way in identifying a form of preventable blindness called Keratoconus.

With the donation coming from Keratoconus Barbados, through funding from CIBC FirstCaribbean’s Com Trust Foundation, the diagnostic capacity of the hospital’s Ophthalmology Department has been expanded. Keratoconus is a condition where the cornea of the eye becomes cone-shaped, which results in impaired vision and photosensitivity, and can advance to the point of blindness.

With the disease being categorised as rare traditionally, prevalence depends on geographic location and Director of Medical Services at the hospital, Dr. Arthur Harris, spoke about it during the handover of the equipment.

“Locally, we have been able to determine that the age of onset is usually in adolescence and progression of the disease spans from the early teenage years into early to mid-adulthood. This means that Keratoconus impacts on the well-being and productivity of young Barbadians. We also know that although anecdotal evidence suggests that it is common enough to have a significant health impact on Barbadians, there is no data on the incidence or prevalence rate of Keratoconus in Barbados to corroborate this evidence,” he said.

Keratoconus Barbados celebrated their first anniversary on January 3 and President Roseanne Myers said that their main aims included informing the public about the disease and helping to arm the hospital to diagnose and treat the disease. With a price tag of $200,000, the machine is expected to aid in the early detection of the condition, saving the eyesight of many Barbadians.

“We are very fortunate that we have been able to, in the year 2020, have a situation where the Queen Elizabeth Hospital has the Pentacam where we can set about our objective to ensure that Barbadians who cannot afford it, are able to come to the hospital, get a diagnosis and we hope, very shortly, to be able to get the condition treated.”

Myers said before going on to add that the next item on the agenda would be used in treating the condition. “The second piece of equipment that we want to provide is a Corneal Cross-linking machine, which means that a child diagnosed young on the Pentacam can be monitored, but if they need that surgery to halt that progression and the bulging of the eye, they can get it free at the hospital and that is our objective.”

Chief Executive Officer of CIBC FirstCaribbean, Colette Delaney, said that her company and their trust was pleased to be a part of the initiative and said that it was an easy decision for them to foot the bill for the piece of machinery as one of the members on their Board of Trustees was also a Keratoconus patient.

“What we learnt that morning was that there are many other members of our staff who are affected by Keratoconus and that this supposedly rare disease was turning out to be not so rare after all, at least not in Barbados and in the region. So for us then, the decision was a bit of a no-brainer. Not so much because of the impact on our own staff members, but because everybody on the Committee recognises the importance of good eyesight to the quality of one’s life and we relish the opportunity to make a real difference to people, who in many cases are really young and whose lives were just beginning to blossom and would be negatively impacted by having been diagnosed with the disease,” Delaney said before going on to add that they would be supporting the maintenance of the machine for the next three years.

Minister of Health and Wellness, Lt. Col. Jeffrey Bostic, was the first person to have his corneas tested on the machine and said that Barbados continues to remain on the cutting-edge of health care in the Caribbean – a fact that Barbadians should be proud of.

“As a public healthcare provider, the QEH is establishing centres of excellence in certain specialist areas of care, one of which is Ophthalmology. I am pleased to state that the Department of Ophthalmology of the QEH is the only eye care facility of its kind within the Caribbean and has garnered a stellar reputation for the delivery of superior care to its patients. Presently, the department provides specialist care in paediatric, glaucoma, neurosurgical and ocuplastics care, which makes it the only eye care facility in the region to offer this range of specialised ophthalmic care and I think that this is something that we in this country should be very proud of,” he said.

Government has intensified its road repair efforts across the island.

In fact, Minister of Transport, Works and Maintenance, Dr. William Duguid, disclosed that major work along High-way 1 will start very soon.

He said that the work along the West Coast will stretch from the roundabout at the bottom of University Hill, St. Michael to Holetown in St. James, with an anticipated completion time of six months.

“What I can tell you is that we have already issued some letters of invitation for contractors to come back to us to do Highway 1,” he disclosed to members of the media after inspecting the work currently under way at Rendezvous Hill.

Dr. Duguid went on to describe that particular road network as “complex”, explaining: “In addition, what we are having to do is take out all of the water mains and we are adding another set of natural gas mains there. So that means trenching and that trenching is going to take us some time.”

“We will talk the country through it because there will be diversions, but we are going to try to do the majority of the work at night, which means that the inconvenience will be reduced. We will have four points of entry coming onto it... We are also looking if possible to get all the electrical infrastructure underground as well, because that means it enhances our hurricane resilience.”

Once Highway 1 is finished, the Minister said that they will move onto Highway 7. He further disclosed that work has started on Wildey Road from the gas station to Bishops Court Hill, and also on the cards are Two Mile Hill, Green Hill, Fairfield, Deacons and Highway 2A.

“For ten years very few roads were done in Barbados and we are now playing catch up… The Prime Minister has been very kind to us giving us some money to work with, and we are going to stretch that money as far as we can to get as many roads done as quickly as we can,” the Minister assured. (TL)

Responding to comments made by the President of the Barbados Economic Society (BES) Simon Naitram about the tourism sector being the only sector registering real growth over the last few years, and calling for more diversification, Prime Minister Mia Amor Mottley suggested that plans were in place.

Taking questions in the hot seat at the Barbados Chamber of Commerce and Industry Luncheon, Mottley reminded those present that she had just recently launched the Chefette manufacturing plant.

“This is probably the first manufacturing plant in over a decade and that is to manufacture ice cream and to manufacture burgers and other meat products and that can be sold not just to Chefette and the cruise ships and others and have international certification and also export.”

The Prime Minister also contended that Barbados was a global business concept not only being seen for tourism but also as it relates to cyber security, had been an attractive narrative to global businesses regarding the set up of bases of operations on the island. Some of those international businesses already calling Barbados home are Gildan and Lenstec.

“That is one of the reasons we feel as well that we can have businesses anchoring and moving to Barbados but providing services and goods to Suriname and Guyana with Barbados as the corporate headquarters. That is a multifaceted approach that goes beyond tourism.”

Mottley continued by saying, “We will not apologise for the fact that the government has before it a major set of proposals for hotels and for villas and other things.”

One of the projects Mottley went on to speak about was the Hyatt Ziva Project which is proposed for Carlisle Bay and the Baystreat area. The project has been under significant scrutiny by the public but Mottley announced that she had been in talks about Carlisle Bay becoming a UNESCO World Heritage site as a crescent shaped bay.

The Prime Minister also referenced the commencement of other expected projects such as, the proposed Royalton Luxury Resort in Holetown slated to begin in May 2020 and Hotel Indigo formerly known as the Caribe Hotel.

“With respect to Sam Lord’s Castle, the work has restarted and I have been very grateful and express gratitude to the Chinese government. We explained to them that we did not, could not come up with counterpart funds and in any event were going to sell. The Chinese construction company enlisted the Barbados Tourism Investment Inc for the counterpart funds for that and that project has actually restarted.”

Mottley reminded the forum that the proposals for the sale of Sam Lord’s Castle had closed on January 31st and those offers would be considered at the appropriate time.

Also mentioned were hotels plans which either had no start date or were under review including Paradise (on former Four Seasons site), Sandals Beaches Resort and a 6 star brand hotel at Port Ferdinand, which was at the Town and Country Planning stage.

“As it relates to Beaches, the Attorney General and I would have met with Mr. Stuart (Gordon) late last year. They say that they are anxious to start and they have put in and asked us to note that they have expanded to an additional 66 rooms.”

One local marriage counsellor believes that there is a significant issue of spousal abuse in Barbados.

Marriage and Family Counsellor and Director of Life Intervention & Support Services, George Greaves highlighted this during an interview with The Barbados Advocate on Wednesday.

He said that social pressures, ideals about masculinity, relationships with their dominant mother and abusive fathers in the home are some of the reasons men are abusive in relationships.

He noted that in his practice it is usually the females who set up the appointment for issues relating to spousal abuse. He added that in these cases, women are the first to come forward for help.

“Usually, the female is the person who has been injured in the relationship, injured ... and she is looking for solutions,” said Greaves.

He also mentioned that after a period of sessions with the female clients, some males will join the therapy while others will not come. He explained that this depended on how long the abuse has been happening, what has been happening and the general attitude of the person and how they perceive the relationship to be.

Men tend to avoid counselling

Greaves outlined in his field, men generally tend to avoid counselling. He said that it is a part of Barbadian culture and it needs to be changed.

He added that some of the education his business is doing in the community is to help males to see that challenge.

“What happens is that such problems tend to get worse either for yourself or (your partner), ” said Greaves.

The marriage counsellor added that in his sessions, there are situations where there are topics that men do not like to talk about with a female. But this also occurs with women as well and this is due to there being a history of abuse from males or a history of control.

“Abuse may not necessarily be hitting or shouting, it may just be that bothering control where the woman even to buy a dress has to get permission.  Sometimes that can be more destructive than (other types of abuse), ” said Greaves.

Abuse is a pattern

The Marriage and Family Counsellor stressed that the pattern of abuse is seen in men who have observed their fathers abusing their mothers during their childhood.

“(These men have seen their) Daddy (being) abusive to mum, (these men) more likely than not will become abusive also. They have this example that this is how we solve problems, ” said Greaves.

He noted that there are some males who are abusive but they do not want to be.

In the situation of an abusive relationship, Greaves said that for the women who are often the victims, they have not set boundaries. He explained that abusers will try to observe the behaviours of their potential vulnerable partners.

“Some abused women move from one abusive relationship to another, ” said Greaves.

He added that his company wants to help these women to set boundaries, safeguards and look for triggers of an abusive partner. He noted that this is the reason his office facilitates pre-marital counselling as the problems of abuse sometimes do not occur until a significant time within a romantic relationship.

THE BARBADOS Water Authority has addressed the backlog of over 6 000 burst mains  in just seven weeks, as a result of a project which was conceptualised and implemented by workers.

Yesterday, Minister of Energy and Water Resources Wilfred Abrahams showered the workers with praise, noting that it is through them  that the calls  to the BWA are now up to date. He also commended the work of the union for making the project a reality.

He was at the time giving an update on the Extended Hours Burst Programme at Tamarind Ave just off Country Road where crews were working on repairing a burst which had only been called in the day before.

Minister Abrahams described the project as a major victory for the BWA. He said a concerted effort was made to erase the “us against them” mentality which existed in the past, noting that there is a more harmonious relationship between the government, the workers and the union.

Minister Abrahams explained that an intensive process was undertaken where every aspect of the BWA was deconstructed and reconstructed to see how processes could be improved.

“A large emphasis in that deconstruct-reconstruct exercise was to get feedback from the people who are actually involved in the processes.

Management does not know it all. I am a politician, I am a lawyer,I was trained as a lawyer. My knowledge of water is what I learned since I came to the ministry and I became a Minister...

It would be foolish of me to think that I know what is best for the Water Authority and I know how best to plan programmes,” he stated.

“We had to take a comprehensive structured approach where we first sought to identify all of the bursts, identify all of the reports, set out a system of how we are going to approach it and start to tackle them one by one to bring them down. I am happy to say that the seven weeks in the project has yielded fantastic results.”

He said the workers stepped up to the plate in a big way. “They said look, let us take this as our project,  let us cost of the project, let us structure the project, let us plan the project, let us put together the teams, let us plan the scheduling and let us deliver to you in a certain time frame and we took a decision as management and the board to hands-off and turn that process over to the workers.”

“As I said we are extremely happy with the results that we have achieved and I hope that this could be a template going forward for cooperative arrangements... working within statutory corporation and companies in Barbados. It is no longer us against them, we are all one team ...The whole of the Barbados Water Authority at every single level in every single department needs to come together and pull to get that done. And this is our success story,” he said.  (JH)

Governor General of Barbados, Her Excellency Dame Sandra Mason, joined Japan’s Ambassador to Barbados, His Excellency, Teruhiko Shinada and his wife, Dragana Mitrovic-Shinada for Japan’s National Day Reception celebrating the 60th birthday of His Majesty, the Emperor of Japan on Wednesday night.

It was truly a special affair as the Governor General arrived decked out in traditional Japanese wear and was welcomed with open arms.

Ambassador Shinada highlighted that Wednesday night’s celebration held significance as it was the first National Day Reception to be held in February under the reign of the new Emperor.

He explained that last year, the former Emperor, Emperor of Heisei, abdicated the throne due to his age and added that this was rare as the last abdication of a living Emperor took place more than 200 years ago.

The Ambassador stated that following the abdication of the Emperor of Heisei, his eldest son, Naruhito, was enthroned as his successor and current Emperor, the 126th Emperor, of Japan.

He went on to note that since his arrival in Barbados as the first resident Ambassador of Japan to Barbados, the relationship between the two countries has flourished.

Minister in the Ministry of Foreign Trade, Sandra Husbands proudly noted that since the establishment of the diplomatic relations between Barbados and Japan in 1967, mutual respect and cooperation have served as the foundation of their interaction which allowed them to be able to celebrate 53 years of friendship, a milestone she considered an incredible achievement.

The establishment of the resident Japanese diplomatic presence in Barbados from 2016 has also served as another strong signal of the friendship between the two countries; a friendship that the Minister believes will only strengthen with the upcoming reestablishment of Barbados’ honorary Consulate in Tokyo and the implementation of the non-resident Barbados Ambassador to Japan, His Excellency Francois Jackman.

“Over the years the relationship between Barbados and Japan has been strengthened in a vast array of areas, including education, climate change, renewable energy, the Arts, sports, technology, agriculture and disaster management. Cultural exchanges and high level visits have also featured prominently in our relationship,” she said.

“I am also aware that the Ambassador continues to make efforts to ensure that the Japanese culture is visible and understood in Barbados. Mr. Ambassador, I wish you well in our efforts and I pledge Barbados’ ongoing cooperation.”

Trade is being hampered by the large number of preferential trade agreements (PTAs) in Latin America and the Caribbean.

Pointing out that there are 33 PTAs in the region alone, the Inter-American Development Bank’s Principal Economic Advisor, Mauricio Moreira, described these as “far too many”, adding that while such agreements were fine in the trade market of the 1990s, they are not good enough for 2020 and beyond.

“On the one hand, they help us to liberalise trade within the region, but it is not good enough in the current environment because… if you want to export within the agreements, you have to comply with the rules of origin which are very cumbersome, very expensive and prevent the formation of regional value chains. So we need to do better and try to take advantage of the full market.

Therefore, he suggested that now may be the time to consider the convergence of the agreements to have a bigger market.

“Of course, there are political constraints to doing this, but we try to think of an agenda where we can be conservative in terms of ambitions and keep all the territory, but let’s make sure that all the territories have the same rules. Or we can be more ambitious and try to go to a region-wide free trade area, which given that we have China, the European Union et cetera, if we want to make a difference we need to be ambitious about,” he asserted.

He told The Barbados Advocate at the Hilton Barbados yesterday that with 90 per cent of the trade liberalised, it will not be an easy task to achieve the same with the remaining ten per cent, as the harmonisation of the agreements would require bringing in Brazil, Mexico and Argentina and getting “Caricom closer to South America, which has not happened yet”.

Nevertheless, Moreira said such a venture would be “a worthwhile agenda”.

“If we want to remain relevant, we need to move towards convergence and we need to become a bigger animal if we want to reap the benefits of trade, and if we want to have any type of bargaining power against China and the United States and the bigger trading partners,” he added.

Prime Minister Mia Amor Mottley has a plan to make travel to The City more convenient.

She made the suggestion to the Second Ideas Forum, calling for the use of City Circle buses – enhancing that mode of transport and making them available around the clock.

In fact, she told the St. Peter We Gatherin’ event at the Alexandra School Hall on Wednesday night, “We are going to have to get out of the habit of putting car parks on beaches. Barbados has the most expensive car parks in the world. Whether it is by the heliport, Hilton, Pirate’s Cove…but we don’t have a lot of land in the centre of town.

“So the only way we are going to get around it is by having a ‘return of transport’ – The City Circle – but not the blue and yellow City Circle. What we need is to have distinctive transport; Barbados must have a distinctive bus again, not just for parties.

“The idea is that within every six to eight minutes I should be able to get onto a bus. If I can get onto a bus every six to eight minutes, having car parks just on the outside in White Park [Road], Spring Garden, Westbury can all of a sudden make sense,” she declared.

Mottley also noted that the problem goes beyond Bridgetown, pointing to both the South and West Coasts of the island, “Because most of our development has taken place very tight, so there isn’t even a lot of room for widening the road without government literally breaking and bankrupting itself in terms of compulsory acquisition…

“So we need to have West Coast and South Coast shuttles. We will have car parks which we will put out to request for proposal (RFP) for ordinary Bajans, because what is a car park but a rectangular building with a bar that comes up and down. And ordinary people should be able to have a car park as an investment in the same way that Tom Adams created the local transport sector and restaurants as opportunities for local investment.”

She continued, “It means we can move the car parks one or two streets in...But within a close enough distance that people can walk, get on the bus and get to their destination without having to provide parking on the particular coast. And that has been one of the biggest constraints in town planning – tourist development, now how do you constrain a country’s opportunities either in terms of tourism product or hotels or villas purely because of car parks.”

Prime Minister Mottley is therefore adamant that if Barbados has reliable public transport, managed by an effective mass transit authority, more and more people will think hard about buying a
vehicle.

“But it means planning and having the buses,” she indicated.

“And we don’t need for Transport Board to own anymore buses because the last government gave away enough licences that we can give people the routes, if they just convert to the kind of buses we want for the shuttles because by having those buses for shuttles, we then bring a quaintness about Barbados’ tourism product.” (TL)

New housing developments in Barbados should be outfitted with renewable energy systems.

So said Senator Dr. Rommell Springer in the Upper House during Wednesday’s sitting, which debated a land acquisition resolution for housing and tourism development in Harrismith, St. Philip.

“Going forward, housing developments should have access to renewable energy. I see no reason why every house should not have photovoltaic panels on the house to offset its energy requirements. These are things that we can look at and while it may be costly up front, 10 to 20 years down the road it will pay itself off,” he added.

Furthermore, Springer said it is necessary to look at building these homes to withstand a Category Five hurricane, stating that while some believe this cannot be done, attempts have to be made to do so at a time when these systems are becoming a norm.

Giving his support to the resolution, he said that government has to continue to try to meet the demand for housing.

“For many years, it has been difficult for poor people to own a house in this country. Difficult to get a loan to buy land or get a mortgage. Sometimes, you see a house that is rotting and dilapidated and there may be two or three people living in it, and you wonder why they are not fixing it.

“It is because there is a lot of money needed to make repairs to a house. You cannot take up $3 000 or $4 000 in Barbados to repair a house, especially a board house, because as you remove one board you may find 10 rotten ones underneath, and then you find yourselves needing $10 000 and you don’t have that to pay up front. So you find some people staying in houses until these are falling down around them,” he stated.
(JMB)

Government’s senior technical advisor, Dr. Kevin Greenidge, says he is confident that Barbados can achieve growth this year once it stays on the current path.

Delivering the feature address at the first business luncheon for the year of the Barbados Chamber of Commerce and Industry, held under the theme ‘Envisioning 2020: The Path Towards a New Decade’, Greenidge said this will include Government sticking to the Barbados Economic Recovery and Transformation (BERT) plan and the private sector playing its part in respect of investment.

He told those gathered that when Government embarked on the BERT programme, its main two missions were to protect the dollar and stabilising the economy, and the second mission was to transform Barbados to be a country of world class excellence. He said this was not going to be an easy task, as under the former government, economic growth was non-existent, noting that at the time of the Mottley Administration assuming office, debt had skyrocketed to 176 per cent of gross domestic product (GDP).

The technical advisor indicated that the situation has improved, with the debt dropping to 119.5 per cent at the end of 2019. This, he said, has been the result of the efforts made to restructure the debt at both the domestic and external levels. He added that at the end of fiscal year 2018/19, government ran a primary balance of 3.5 per cent GDP.

“Our programme is hinged on, anchored on a debt trajectory that converts to 60 per cent by 2033; underlying that is a primary surplus balance that must get us there. We are committed to getting six per cent for a few years and then we would taper off accordingly. This year so far, the year ending in December, we are 4.8, 4.9 per cent of GDP. Of course that means a lot of sacrifices, a lot of fixing the fiscal inefficiencies, tightening up here and there,” he stressed.

Greenidge said government has attained fiscal sustainability, such that the finances are now in order and there is a commitment to keeping that way. His comments came as he said that foreign exchange reserves are also on the rise, standing right now over $1.4 billion, which equates to about 18.7 weeks of import cover. Moreover, he said, Government has also been able to reduce its arrears in central government from $1.2 billion 18 months ago to $167 million today.
(JRT)

The year 2020 is going to be a great year for Barbados; and Prime Minister Mia Amor Mottley attributes this to the fact that Barbados’ foreign reserves have been able to grow to $740 million USD.

Mottley revealed this Thursday evening, as she delivered remarks during the opening ceremony of the Annual Consultation with Caribbean Governors, which was hosted by the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) at the Hilton Resort.

She stated that this goal did not happen by accident and attributes this achievement to the help of organisations such as the IDB and the Caribbean Development Bank, adding that she believed that Barbados would not have been able to lift itself out of the hole it dug itself into, without the help of these entities, among others.

Mottley noted that while it has become easier to “lift ourselves out of the hole” there is still recovery work and heavy lifting that needs to be done.

“But what you did was to allow us to be able to see the opportunities, to be able to see the way that the Governor of the Central Bank pointed out recently, that growth is ahead of us in this year of our Lord,” she said.

“This is a country, whose economy stagnated over the last decade, we call it the lost decade and we say it stagnated because in real terms there has been a devaluation in the lives and pockets of Barbadians and there has been too many institutions that we wish to recount at this stage.

“We have turned a corner and despite the efforts of the media to distort what was said yesterday, the future of this country this year looks good.”

She was adamant that the future did not look good simply because they wanted it to, as persons have said in the media, but rather the future looked good because of the actual hard work has been done on projects. (CLJB)

The Government of Barbados has just signed two more loan deals meant to help Barbados’ economy grow.

This was revealed by Prime Minister Mia Amor Mottley, as she spoke during the opening ceremony of the Annual Consultation with Caribbean Governors, which was hosted by the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) at the Hilton Resort, Thursday evening.

“The two loans that we just signed could not have been signed without the serious work of structuring out what would be done, both as preconditions to those loans as well as now the execution of them to modernise the Barbados public service with $40 million USD that would allow us to move ministry to ministry to ministry to not only reconstruct the rules, but to digitise where possible and to make it possible for the average Barbadian company or citizen to access records and access services in a serious way,” she said.

The Prime Minister continued, “The $30 million USD that we just signed for with the smart energy allows us to be able to leverage renewable energy on many of Governments properties. The Government of Barbados is
spending about $400 million USD a year on the importation of fuel at a time when the geopolitics of the world threatens to increase that amount because we don’t know when how or where we might have to now face a scarcity of supply and an increase in prices because of a decisions being taken elsewhere that might not always match the application of knowledge or wisdom.”

The Prime Minister went on to note that things such as climate change and the like were having a negative impact on the performance of our economy, and the capacity of the economy to be resilient.

And moving forward, it is her hope that the IDB provides financial assistance to be able to drill down on these issues to find solutions and be able to meet the concerns of the population.(CLJB)

It is important to create an environment that allows young people to be able to grow, was the view of President of the Inter-American Development Bank, Luis Alberto Moreno as he spoke Thursday evening during the opening ceremony of the Annual Consultation with Caribbean Governors, which was hosted by the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) at the Hilton Resort.

“We should think about how many other inventors who are growing up right here in the Caribbean and in Barbados, and the question of course is, are we doing everything we can to give these future inventors the opportunities they need to reach their God given potential?” he said.

He added that these young inventors were the kind of people they would need in the future to solve some of the world’s biggest problems and therefore it was important that their conversation over the next few days focused on ways to harness the untapped potential of all the citizens in the Caribbean.

He noted that the Caribbean offered an oasis of stability despite the issues of climate change, crime and the global economy.

Moreno believes that in order to ignite economic growth in this context of Caribbean countries, it is important to advance their economies in order to ensure that they are on the cutting edge in both the public and private sectors.

“Think of the next computer scientist from the region... are we giving him or her in a way that increases their potential? Are we making it easy for her to travel to and from school safely? Are we protecting her from gender-based discrimination and violence? When she comes of age it should be easy for her to open a business and protect her intellectual property, are we doing all that we can to ensure that a hurricane doesn’t destroy everything she worked hard to build?” he questioned.

“In our conversations today I would like for us to really get to the heart of what it would take to move the Caribbean to the next level of development. What would it take for us to build resilient countries with collective smart citizens?” Moreno asked.

THE Barbados Water Authority’s (BWA) worker-led Extended Hours Burst programme will come to a close on February 14 on a very good note.

In fact, BWA Director of Engineering Charles Leslie explained that the backlog of calls and complaints about burst pipes across the island has been erased. He was speaking to the media on Wednesday where he highlighted the role of the union representatives and workers to make this project a reality.

“We had about 11 000 calls on thesystem. Where we did an assessment approximately 6 000 of those were actually jobs add a number of them were just duplicates, i.e, people calling back a number of times. But we have completely reduce the back log of 6 000.”

He explained how the 12-week programme worked. “At the onset of the programme we had crews that were just working from 8 am until 4 pm. We had 14 plumbing crews working in the distribution section, they were just working from eight until four and then on weekends and bank holidays we had a skeleton crew doing burst repairs. Under this programme we extended those hours so all of the crews have been working from 7 am to 7 pm Monday to Saturday, and then on Sundays and holidays we have between three to four crews working.”

“With that number of crews out there on the island addressing the problems we were able to reduce those complaints and we are actually current with the complaints that are coming in. This problem that we are working on today was only reported yesterday and we are here today to do repairs on this one,” Abrahamscontinued.

He noted that whereas in the “normal” programme, teams were carrying out 750 repairs per month, with the new programme the crews were able to double and go even further.

“Once we have addressed these obviously we are reducing the non-revenue water – we are addressing the complaints. So we don’t have those frequent complaints. We are reducing the duplicates in the system as well, because what we found is when we have things running for too long, we have a number of customers calling repeated times so then we have multiple complaints for the same problem. And we have reduced all of that in our system,” he said.

President of the Barbados Workers’ Union Division of the BWA Carl Boyce assured that systems will be put in place to ensure that the backlog will not return. “So we are improving on that as well even though the programme might stop on the 14th we are still having a system where the burst pipes will be managed in a timely manner,” he said.

Assessing the programme from the union’s perspective Boyce said, “We were glad to sit across the table with both the management and the Minister in relation to improving the service to Barbados because we know it is a service that we are delivering to Barbados and theworkers have a part to play in it.”

He also thanked Minister Abrahams for ensuring that workers had adequate materials and equipment to carry out the tasks. (JH)

THE Barbados Water Authority’s (BWA) worker-led Extended Hours Burst programme will come to a close on February 14 on a very good note.

In fact, BWA Director of Engineering Charles Leslie explained that the backlog of calls and complaints about burst pipes across the island has been erased. He was speaking to the media on Wednesday where he highlighted the role of the union representatives and workers to make this project a reality.

“We had about 11 000 calls on thesystem. Where we did an assessment approximately 6 000 of those were actually jobs add a number of them were just duplicates, i.e, people calling back a number of times. But we have completely reduce the back log of 6 000.”

He explained how the 12-week programme worked. “At the onset of the programme we had crews that were just working from 8 am until 4 pm. We had 14 plumbing crews working in the distribution section, they were just working from eight until four and then on weekends and bank holidays we had a skeleton crew doing burst repairs. Under this programme we extended those hours so all of the crews have been working from 7 am to 7 pm Monday to Saturday, and then on Sundays and holidays we have between three to four crews working.”

“With that number of crews out there on the island addressing the problems we were able to reduce those complaints and we are actually current with the complaints that are coming in. This problem that we are working on today was only reported yesterday and we are here today to do repairs on this one,” Abrahamscontinued.

He noted that whereas in the “normal” programme, teams were carrying out 750 repairs per month, with the new programme the crews were able to double and go even further.

“Once we have addressed these obviously we are reducing the non-revenue water – we are addressing the complaints. So we don’t have those frequent complaints. We are reducing the duplicates in the system as well, because what we found is when we have things running for too long, we have a number of customers calling repeated times so then we have multiple complaints for the same problem. And we have reduced all of that in our system,” he said.

President of the Barbados Workers’ Union Division of the BWA Carl Boyce assured that systems will be put in place to ensure that the backlog will not return. “So we are improving on that as well even though the programme might stop on the 14th we are still having a system where the burst pipes will be managed in a timely manner,” he said.

Assessing the programme from the union’s perspective Boyce said, “We were glad to sit across the table with both the management and the Minister in relation to improving the service to Barbados because we know it is a service that we are delivering to Barbados and theworkers have a part to play in it.”

He also thanked Minister Abrahams for ensuring that workers had adequate materials and equipment to carry out the tasks. (JH)

Independent Senator Dr. Christopher Maynard is urging government to look into certain developments in therenewable energy sector.

Saying the industry, which could prove financially beneficial to some homeowners was now beginning to blossom, he encouraged the current administration to ensure the sector was not being abused.

“There are some sections of Barbados, if you take a look at Google Earth and look at photographs, particularly the large buildings, you would note that they are all black and we know that to have a safe and sustainable grid, we cannot have more than a percentage of the energy being produced by small producers.

“If any particular group moves into parishes and takes up that quota, it eliminates the possibility for small house owners from benefiting and its being done in front of our eyes and nobody is saying anything, but I am saying something about it Mr. President. If we allow the large persons to take up all the space on the grid, the small homeowner cannot benefit and it is happening, so I call upon the government to look into it,” he stated.

He was speaking in the Upper House earlier this week during the debate of a resolution to acquire land at Harrismith, St. Philip.

Maynard used the opportunity to encourage the current administration to ensure the rights of Barbadians and visitors to access the nation’s beaches were not infringed upon.

“We are in danger of such times returning and it is important that we make sure that our beaches are accessible for all. Not only for those who lie under umbrellas and chairs but for all,” he stressed.

The ENT specialist also expressed concerns the largest police station in the country –  District ‘A’ – had no functioning canteen for its staff, saying this was not good enough for those tasked with protecting the island on a 24-hour basis.

“Why do they have to get food from a van that drives in. Why do they not have a canteen in the largest facility in the country… Some of these problems have easy solutions and government needs to sit down with the services and fix some of them,” he said. (JMB)

New housing developments in Barbados should be outfitted with renewable energy systems.

So said Senator Dr. Rommell Springer in the Upper House during Wednesday’s sitting, which debated a land acquisition resolution for housing and tourism development in Harrismith, St. Philip.

“Going forward, housing developments should have access to renewable energy. I see no reason why every house should not have photovoltaic panels on the house to offset its energy requirements. These are things that we can look at and while it may be costly up front, 10 to 20 years down the road it will pay itself off,” he added.

Furthermore, Springer said it is necessary to look at building these homes to withstand a Category Five hurricane, stating that while some believe this cannot be done, attempts have to be made to do so at a time when these systems are becoming a norm.

Giving his support to the resolution, he said that government has to continue to try to meet the demand for housing.

“For many years, it has been difficult for poor people to own a house in this country. Difficult to get a loan to buy land or get a mortgage. Sometimes, you see a house that is rotting and dilapidated and there may be two or three people living in it, and you wonder why they are not fixing it.

“It is because there is a lot of money needed to make repairs to a house. You cannot take up $3 000 or $4 000 in Barbados to repair a house, especially a board house, because as you remove one board you may find 10 rotten ones underneath, and then you find yourselves needing $10 000 and you don’t have that to pay up front. So you find some people staying in houses until these are falling down around them,” he stated. (JMB)

Government, cognisant of the lack of a comprehensive perfor-mance management system to assess public sector workers, is looking to put such a system in place.

That’s according to Prime Minister Mia Amor Mottley, she was speaking earlier this week during the Barbados Chamber of Commerce and Industry’s luncheon at the Hilton Hotel. Responding to a concern raised by a member of the audience about the use of the last in first out (LIFO) policy when it retrenched workers last year, Mottley explained that the absence of such a proper performance management system meant that Government had no choice but to agree with the unions on the LIFO.

“We are working assiduously to put in performance evaluation and we are working assiduously to be able to change our relationship with public servants,” she said.

In that vein, she said if ever such a retrenchment exercise has to be undertaken again, they can base it on performance and merit in a transparent and fair way. Her comments came as she acknowledged that given the smallness of our society, managers are sometimes reluctant to tell persons when they are underperforming, or if they are told, the response is usually a feeling of not being liked.

“But it has nothing at all to do with not liking the person, but you didn’t do your job in the way you were supposed to do it. So let’s wheel and come again and get it right,” she stated.

PM Mottley’s remarks came as she said that the rigid way in which the public service is currently run, is having an impact on productivity.

“If you mother has to go to the hospital you either take a sick day or a vacation day in order to be able to do it, that’s antiquated... the Social Partnership has been working to allow us to put new rules in place that would allow us to be able to introduce a system of lieu days up to seven days,” she said.

Mottley added, “We’re trying to put under the National Training Initiative, significant sums now into being able to retrain everybody. I am not an HR expert so here is how I explain it – what does excellence look like? Define it. Train to it, certify to it if you can and monitor the habit of excellence and we are trying to do that across the public and private sector”. (JRT)