Manifesto ’07

Manifesto ’07 Table Of Contents

Key Objectives...... iv Action To Restore Trust...... iv Message To The Bahamian People...... 1 By the Rt. Hon. Hubert A. Ingraham Leader of the Opposition

Section 1 Crime...... 2 Royal Bahamas Police Force...... 2 Royal Bahamas Defence Force...... 3 Immigration...... 3 Administration Of Justice...... 4 Law Reform...... 5 Prison Reform...... 5 Section 2 Economy And Jobs...... 6 Globalisation and Free Trade...... 6 Fiscal Policy...... 6 Business and Commerce...... 6 Tourism...... 7 Financial Services...... 7 Insurance Industry...... 7 Marine Resources...... 8 Consumer Protection...... 8 Industrial Relations...... 8 Linking Economic Sectors...... 8 Section 3 Education...... 10 Infrastructural Development...... 10 For Primary and High Schools...... 10 For Pre-schools...... 11 For Teachers...... 11 Technical And Vocational Education...... 11 Tertiary Education...... 11 Public Libraries...... 11 Development Of Our Youth...... 12 Section 4 Social Agenda...... 14 Health...... 14 Health Infrastructural Expansion...... 19 Conditions of Service for Health Care Professionals...... 19 The Disabled Community...... 19 Table Of Contents

Section 5 Land Ownership...... 20 Urban Renewal & Community Development...... 20 City of Nassau...... 20 Liveable Neighbourhoods...... 21 Parks & Open Green Spaces...... 21 Access to Beaches...... 22 Housing...... 22 Infrastructure Development...... 23 Public Utility Corporations...... 23 Water & Sewerage Corporation...... 23 Bahamas Telecommunication Company (BTC)...... 23 Bahamas Electricity Corporation...... 23 Energy Policy...... 23 Roads, Ports And Docks...... 23 New Providence...... 23 Family Islands...... 24 Civil Aviation...... 24 Section 6 Local Government...... 26 In Grand Bahama...... 26 In the Family Islands...... 26 In New Providence...... 26 Family Island Development...... 26 Grand Bahama Development...... 27 Environment And Sustainable Development...... 27 Disaster Preparedness And Response...... 28 Section 7 Heritage...... 30 Sports & Leisure...... 30 International Relations...... 31 Consular Matters...... 31 The Bahamas Foreign Service...... 32 Public Sector Reform...... 32 Improving Delivery of Services from the Public Sector...... 32 Relations With The Media...... 34

The FNM Record of Trust, 1992-2002...... 35 Standards in Public Life...... 36 The Seven Principles of Public Life...... 36 Standards of Conduct for Ministers of Government...... 37 III...... 36 The Free National Movement Manifesto ’07 Dedicated to Restoring TRUST in Government

Key Objectives ■ To restore trust in government ■ To deepen and strengthen our democracy ■ To guard and protect our national sovereignty ■ To ensure domestic security and tranquility ■ To improve the delivery of public services ■ To improve public security ■ To ensure sustainable economic development ■ To ensure access to land for Bahamians ■ To guard, conserve and promote Bahamian heritage ■ To protect and conserve our natural environment ■ To alleviate poverty ■ To make affordable health insurance available to all ■ To improve the quality of education ■ To support healthy life styles and promote family life

The FNM: Action To Restore Trust Upon taking office, the FNM will immediately take action to restore your faith in our system of government by: ■ Better monitoring and enforcing standards of conduct for Ministers and other Members of Parliament ■ Being accountable to the people through regular public reports on the state of our country, and by ensuring media access to information ■ Answering questions asked by the Opposition in the Parliament ■ Requiring the Public Service to become more responsive to the concerns of citizens ■ Making public in the House of Assembly all agreements with international investors messAGe To THe BAHAmIAn PeoPLe By the Rt. Hon. Hubert A. Ingraham Leader of the Opposition

My Fellow Citizens It is with pride and pleasure that I invite you to read the Manifesto of the Free National Movement for the 2007 general election. Our party’s Manifesto is not just a piece of campaign paraphernalia. It is a set of promises to the Bahamian people and, should we become the Government, a binding contract with the people. We ask you to trust us to deliver on our promises because we have delivered before. Check the record. The performance of the FNM in offi ce has been unmatched. This PLP Government has not even come close. Indeed during the past fi ve years they have undone much of the good work we did. And they have broken faith with you, the people, through their incompetence, scandals, and secrecy. But we are right here, ready to renew your trust and to rebuild, again. Upon taking offi ce, we will immediately set about restoring your faith by enacting our Trust Agenda, which includes doing things like making public all agreements with international investors, enforcing standards of conduct for Ministers and giving regular public reports on the state of our country. Having renewed your trust, we will move forward with tackling our country’s biggest challenges. In these pages are our plans for creating a better future for all. Over many months we have given careful consideration to ideas not only from within the party but from many sources in the community. We have listened to the complaints about what is happening now, and to the articulation of the dreams and aspirations of a broad cross-section of our country. The distillation of all those ideas has become Manifesto ’07. We have set out our positions and commitments in Manifesto ’07 in short form. We hope that many of our citizens will read it Our Manifesto forms an important part of the package we present to you. Another important part is the team we have assembled, after long and careful consideration, to represent the constituencies and the nation as a whole. We are competent, we are committed and we are ready. On Election Day, the ballot will present you choices. Change versus More of the Same. A Renewed Trust versus a Broken Trust. The choice is clear. My colleagues and I look forward confi dently to your mandate. We commit ourselves to work tirelessly for the good of Bahamians living in each and every constituency, in every community, and in every island and cay in this blessed Commonwealth. May God guide us.

Hubert A. Ingraham Leader, Free National Movement

1 Dedicated To Restoring TrusT In Government

Crime Royal Bahamas The FNM has a comprehensive plan to reduce Police Force crime and better protect Bahamian families. To To ensure the capacity and capability of the this end your FNM Government will: Police to carry out its mandate to protect Baha- ✓ Expand the community policing programme mian citizens and other residents and visitors to ✓ Develop school curricula with healthy lifestyle our shores your FNM Government will: initiatives and mentoring programmes to sensitize ✓ Ensure that merit and leadership attributes are our children to the importance of making good restored as criteria for advancement choices and avoiding violence as a means of confl ict resolution ✓ Complete the review of salary scales ✓ Implement programmes designed to tackle social ✓ Provide special focus upon improving the terms and problems of addictions, domestic violence, and conditions of work recidivism ✓ Provide increased insurance coverage ✓ Promote non-violent resolution of confl icts ✓ Ensure adequate funding for the acquisition, ✓ Ensure that all residential streets are named and maintenance and operation of police vehicles have street signs ✓ Provide upgraded training, locally and ✓ Ensure that all buildings are numbered internationally, for junior and senior offi cers ✓ Ensure that street lighting is maintained ✓ Establish a National Forensic Institute with a DNA section, to operate independently but in conjunction ✓ Assist home-owners and businesses to help with the Police Service prevent crime by reducing import duties on security equipment, components and supplies ✓ Establish Distance Education Programmes for Family Island Offi cers to continue their education ✓ Regularly review police requirements in all communities to ensure that the number of offi cers ✓ Ensure that communications systems are assigned is in accordance with the needs of maintained at state-of-the-art levels the community ✓ Convert the Police College into a Police Academy ✓ Continue to develop and expand the Cadet Programme ✓ Ensure police investigation techniques and technologies are up-to-date

2 Royal Bahamas Immigration Defence Force To address growing immigration concerns To improve our defence in relation to your FNM Government will: poachers of our marine resources, illegal ✓ Articulate and implement a medium to long-term immigration and illegal drug traffi cking your immigration policy providing for timely, transparent FNM Government will: and expeditious application processes, and the regularization of the status of long-time residents ✓ Address the unmet need to improve the terms and and the registration of children born abroad to conditions of service Bahamian married women ✓ Further review salaries ✓ Ensure that immigration policies refl ect the ✓ Enhance insurance coverage priorities and needs of our people and our economy ✓ Complete the Defence Force Training Centre ✓ Reduce the number of illegal immigrants in the country by sustained regular and routine arrest, ✓ Provide for increased training opportunities both detention and repatriation of illegal immigrants at home and abroad found in The Bahamas ✓ Establish an Independent Commission to assume ✓ Introduce minimum processing periods prior to the responsibility for the appointment, promotion and grant of immigration status to applicants with no discipline of offi cers and enlisted men familial connection to The Bahamas ✓ Ensure adequate funding ✓ Approve work permits for foreign persons to ✓ Upgrade and expand the fl eet be engaged in The Bahamas only as and when suitable and trained Bahamians are not available, ✓ Purchase and put to sea additional medium or are unwilling to accept such employment range craft ✓ Refuse work permits to individuals who enter ✓ Make inoperable craft operational the country as visitors, or who have entered the ✓ Re-establish the air wing to improve the detection country illegally capability ✓ Introduce fraud proof immigration permits ✓ Purchase and put into service two appropriate ✓ Reorganize and bring order to the Immigration surveillance aircraft Department ✓ Cause the dredging of the harbour, the construction ✓ Make, publish and implement clear, transparent of new sea walls and the installation of a fuel farm policies at the Coral Harbour Base ✓ Recruit, train and deploy additional immigration ✓ Improve equipment and support to enhance offi cers disaster preparedness and response capabilities ✓ Require the routine observance of established and ✓ Upgrade facilities at Inagua published immigration rules ■ Establish a permanent presence in the southern Bahamas from which regular patrols of our waters ✓ Ensure the enforcement of immigration laws will be undertaken without fear or favour ✓ Establish and maintain a permanent presence in ✓ Provide for the timely processing of applications the northern Bahamas for expatriate skilled labour or technical expertise required in the economy but not available in the country

It’s A Matter of TrusT

3 Administration Of Justice To provide our country with the effi cient, ✓ Ensure that the Legal Service is adequately funded competent, functioning judicial system required and staffed so as to effi ciently and effectively fulfi ll for an orderly society and for continued its mandate economic growth your FNM Government will: ✓ Ensure that the remuneration and conditions of service of professional staff in the Offi ce of the ✓ Provide for the fi nancial and administrative Attorney General are such as to encourage them autonomy of the Judicial Service to remain in the service ✓ Substantially increase funding to the Judicial ✓ Engage legally trained persons to conduct Service to provide for its adequate staffi ng prosecutions in the Magistrates Courts and operation ✓ Construct a new Supreme Court Complex to provide ✓ Make the Judicial Service an “approved public modern facilities and security for all persons authority” involved in the judicial process ✓ Facilitate the appointment of additional criminal ✓ Complete the Magistrates’ Courts Complex on law judges so as to minimize delays and reduce Nassau and South Streets the backlog of serious criminal cases ✓ Ensure that the laws of The Bahamas are ✓ Facilitate the appointment of commercial law respected and observed by all persons including judges so as to address the requirements of the the Government fi nancial services sector ✓ Ensure compliance with the constitutional ✓ Ensure that the Judiciary is, and is seen to be, requirement for fair trials of all persons charged independent with criminal offences within a reasonable time ✓ Ensure that the terms and conditions of service ✓ Enact criminal sentencing guidelines to provide for the Judiciary are such that the best qualifi ed wider and more effective sentencing alternatives judges, Bahamians and non-Bahamians, are for the courts, especially for fi rst time non-violent attracted to serve offenders ✓ Ensure that the terms and conditions of service ✓ Explore the feasibility of the implementation of a for the magistracy are such that the best qualifi ed Restorative Justice programme persons are attracted to serve and to remain as members of the magistracy ✓ Establish a statutory government-funded legal aid scheme

4 Law Reform ✓ Appoint a full time Law Reform Commissioner ✓ Ensure that law reform is an ongoing undertaking ✓ Require the Law Reform Commissioner to undertake a review of all laws enacted in The Bahamas prior to 1973 to determine whether they We in The Bahamas ought to be repealed or amended to refl ect the “ needs of a 21st Century Bahamas cherish our right to ✓ Amend the Juries Act to allow for smaller juries in non-capital criminal cases choose our government ✓ Review the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act to allow for the removal of criminal records after through the exercise of periods of good behaviour, except where a person has been convicted and sentenced for a capital the franchise at the ballot offence, rape, possession of dangerous drugs with intent to supply, kidnapping or any sexual offence involving a child box. However, we fully appreciate that a stable Prison Reform To address concerns with overcrowding and and successful democracy security risks at Her Majesty’s Prison in Fox depends also on our Hill, to address staff morale problems, reduce recidivism and to improve the reintegration commitment to the rule of of convicted persons in society following completion of their sentences, your FNM law. As we observe the Government will: ✓ Introduce additional modern methods of prison struggle of many millions management ✓ Upgrade and convert the existing prison into around the world to a medium security facility ✓ Construct a new maximum security prison achieve democracy and the to reduce overcrowding and to facilitate the separation of serious, violent criminals from rule of law, we are all the other convicts and to provide for the relocation of persons on remand more inclined to celebrate ✓ Ensure adequate funding our good fortune. ✓ Review the salary scales of prison offi cers ” ✓ Increase the number of offi cers ✓ Increase training for all levels of offi cer in the – Hubert A. Ingraham prison service ✓ Further upgrade and expand rehabilitative programmes available to inmates ✓ Expand the work programme and skills training and rehabilitation available to inmates

5 Dedicated To Restoring Trust In Government

✓ Form strategic international partnerships with Economy And Jobs nations within the Caribbean Community and the To strengthen our economy, promote Association of Caribbean States increased Bahamian ownership and wealth, ✓ Negotiate membership in the World Trade and create new, high quality jobs your FNM Organization (WTO) to create new markets for Government will: Bahamian products ✓ Eliminate Exchange Control during its term in office ✓ Foster strong economic growth Fiscal policy ✓ Adopt a “Balanced Budget” fiscal policy ✓ Encourage both domestic and foreign investment ✓ Maintain a no income tax fiscal regime ✓ Place emphasis on the sustainability of economic growth ✓ Reduce the heavy reliance for balance of payments support on the sale of Bahamian land to foreigners ✓ Reduce bureaucratic obstacles for domestic and international businesses ✓ Address the huge external imbalance created by such land sales ✓ Ensure that Government’s role in the economy is confined to that of facilitator and regulator ✓ Simplify the Customs Tariff ✓ Enact an omnibus Business Licencing Act to ✓ Amalgamate customs duty and stamp tax provide for a single licence for all businesses, ✓ Reduce Real Property Tax rates payable on except for the provision of financial, insurance commercial properties and professional services, gaming and allied building trades ✓ Exempt new home-owners from the payment of Real Property Tax for a period of five years ✓ Promote and support the development of following upon the completion of a new The Bahamas as an electronically and owner-occupied residence technologically sophisticated country ✓ Ensure additional linkages between tourism and other sectors of the economy Business and Commerce ✓ Accelerate Bahamian ownership in the economy ✓ Reduce bureaucratic obstacles for businesses ✓ Expand and simplify the Government Loan ✓ Establish a Small and Medium Size Enterprises Guarantee programme in support of small Facilitation Centre to serve as a one-stop agency to Bahamian businesses assist with business plans, funding and follow-up ✓ Ensure additional linkages between tourism and other sectors of the economy particularly Globalisation and Free Trade agriculture, fisheries, and light manufacturing To enhance the preparedness of our economy ✓ Increase government information and services for success in an increasingly competitive obtainable or accessible to the public electronically international environment your FNM Government will: ✓ Ensure increased transparency in economic and government systems

 Tourism Financial Services To deliver an improved tourism product for To ensure that our financial services sector international and domestic tourists your FNM remains attractive, internationally competitive Government will: and adequately regulated your FNM ✓ Upgrade the City of Nassau Government will: ✓ Extend the tourism sector to encompass traditional ✓ Maintain The Bahamas as a low-tax jurisdiction residential and commercial areas of New ✓ Continue advocacy of a level playing field for Providence including Over-the-Hill locations and so standards to be observed by providers of financial add depth to the tourism product and experience services internationally ✓ Promote the redevelopment of Down Town Bay ✓ Ensure the timely amendment or enactment of Street with the creation of Bahamian-styled relevant legislation outdoor restaurants, eateries and cultural ✓ Rationalize our regulatory regimes so as to reduce enterprises overlap and duplication ✓ Encourage and facilitate additional international ✓ Create a statutory Financial Services Board investment in the tourism and resort sector of the economy ✓ Increase Government’s contribution to the annual marketing budget of private sector-driven ✓ Support and promote the development of marketing initiatives on a 50/50 basis environmentally-compatible resorts in the Family Islands ✓ Address the capacity building need within regulatory bodies ✓ Increase government support for the expansion of Bahamian ownership of high-end boutique-style ✓ Facilitate the engagement of an adequate number guest houses and inns of professional and administrative professionals in the legal and judicial services ✓ Require the maximum use of Bahamian produced and/or sourced materials, services and products ✓ Ensure that Bahamian overseas Missions, in the construction, outfitting and operation of all particularly in London and Washington D.C., hotels and resorts as a precondition to access have economic officers with financial services customs duty concessions experience and expertise ✓ Encourage the registration of mega yachts ✓ Encourage the development of a School of Business (akin to the Swiss Banking School) at ✓ Further develop the School of Hospitality and the College of The Bahamas Tourism ✓ Ensure the availability of internationally competitive ✓ Restore and conserve Bahamian monuments, telecommunications and electricity services historic buildings and artifacts for the enjoyment of residents and visitors alike ✓ Increase the promotion of Heritage Tourism Insurance Industry ✓ Provide increased marketing support to owners To facilitate the expansion of the insurance and operators of small hotels and resorts sector and ensure competent regulation of the ✓ Undertake a sustained beautification and anti-litter sector, your FNM Government will: campaign throughout the country ✓ Replace the Office of the Registrar of Insurance ✓ Create a new organization with a supervisory oversight role in the insurance sector similar to that of the Central Bank of The Bahamas in the banking sector ✓ Pursue the re-establishment of a captive insurance industry ✓ Enact a new Pensions Act

 Marine Resources Industrial Relations ✓ Expand the network of marine reserves ✓ Strengthen and improve Labour Administration ✓ Continue to protect grouper and other spawning ✓ Further strengthen Government’s labour relations aggregations through bipartite and tripartite consultation ✓ Review and amend conservation orders so as ✓ Enhance and simplify protocols for trade to take into account local knowledge of fish union recognition aggregations that do not occur simultaneously ✓ Establish proper and well-organized labour in all parts of the Archipelago exchanges ✓ Review and amend fisheries regulations ✓ Institute a more effective system for the settlement ✓ Give consideration to the prohibition of the sale of disputes between employers and employees in local restaurants and hotels of spiny lobster, ✓ Introduce a system of apprenticeship in essential outside of the spiny lobster season disciplines such as the building trades, motor ✓ Review size for marine resources which may be mechanics, appliance repairs, printing, garment caught by pleasure craft manufacture, cabinet and furniture-making ✓ Encourage Mari-culture projects to augment the ✓ Provide incentives for private firms to offer increasing demand for edible fish profit-sharing arrangements or share/stock ✓ Review and amend the marine mammals legislation options to their employees ✓ Increase the network of fisheries officers ✓ Promote technical and vocational training in the and vessels public and private sectors ✓ Expand flexi-time in the public sector and encourage its expansion in the private sector ✓ Assist unions and others in the operation and Consumer Protection management of community centres and day care facilities for children of working parents So as to provide Bahamians with improved protection against dishonest and/or unfair business practices your FNM Government will: ✓ Establish a consumer protection agency Linking Economic ✓ Mount a sustained consumer education campaign Sectors ✓ Provide for: ✓ Establish a one-stop investment agency ■ the transfer of loans or mortgages between banking ✓ Encourage and support manufacturing and food institutions at no cost to the customer processing industries ■ the right for borrowers to choose lawyers to do their home mortgage and business loan legal work ✓ Expand and simplify the Government Loan Guarantee Programme ■ the right for borrowers to use the insurance company of their choice in relation to home and ✓ Promote real and effective linkages between business mortgages the manufacturing sector and the tourism and ✓ Require all vehicles to be insured against full retail sectors third party risk; providing financial compensation for bodily harm as well as property damage for which the driver of the vehicle is determined to be legally liable

  Dedicated To Restoring TrusT In Government

Education For Primary and High Schools To provide Bahamian children with quality ✓ Ensure that the government-operated high schools offer academic and vocational training to meet the education and to prepare them for the future needs of our national economy your FNM Government will: ✓ Ensure that adequate numbers of qualifi ed teachers ✓ Develop a 10-year education plan and a 10-year are engaged in the government-operated school literacy plan system ✓ Observe the letter and spirit of the Education Act ✓ Establish a system for continuing review of the as it relates to the functions of the Department of curriculum to ensure that it remains consistent with Education, and respect the role of school boards, the needs of a 21st century Bahamas school administrators and parents in the education ✓ Place increased emphasis on improved literacy, of our children numeracy and oracy skills among all students ✓ In consultation with educational bodies, require ✓ Make the completion of a course in Bahamian that all schools in The Bahamas be made history a requirement for graduation from high accessible to the disabled school in The Bahamas ✓ Include information technology, tourism studies and Infrastructural Development fi nancial services in the mainstream curriculum of government-operated schools ✓ Bring all government-operated schools up to an acceptable standard and provide for their proper ✓ Strengthen the Magnet School System maintenance and upkeep. ✓ Introduce interactive Distance Education to Family ✓ Reduce overcrowding in schools through the Island Schools planned expansion of classrooms and the ✓ Require a physical fi tness programme for all construction of new neighbourhood schools. schools ✓ Construct new schools and school additions to ✓ Provide a nutritionally-balanced lunch meet the demand of communities programme for students attending government- operated schools

10 For Pre-schools Tertiary Education ✓ Collaborate with churches and others to cause an In recognition of the key role of The College increase in pre-school places to meet the needs of working parents of The Bahamas in the development of The Bahamas your FNM Government will: ✓ Develop a grant-in-aid programme for qualifying pre-school and after-school care programmes ✓ Utilize the research expertise at the College to inform the development of national policies ✓ Increase scholarship funding for Bahamian For Teachers students wishing to enter the College ✓ Populate the Teaching Service Commission ✓ Reinstate the payment by the Government of one ✓ Grant teachers adjustments in their pay to half of interest charges in respect of government produce parity in pay between teachers and other guaranteed educational loans professionals within the Public Service ✓ Facilitate the construction of new dormitories to ✓ Expand the Career Path for teachers accommodate Family Island students ✓ Provide increased funding for training and ✓ Encourage the College of The Bahamas to require retraining of teachers all students to take a course in Bahamian history ✓ Further improve the terms and conditions of and government service of teachers ✓ Support the College’s efforts to construct a new Natural Sciences Building and a new Teacher Technical And Vocational Education Education Building ✓ Facilitate the transformation of the College into the In recognition of the critical importance University of The Bahamas of technical and vocational education and training to our efforts to supply suitably trained individuals to meet the skilled labour demands of our economy your FNM Government will: Public Libraries ✓ Enact legislation establishing a National Training So as to support improved literacy and to Agency responsible for coordination and promote and support a culture of continuous development of technical and vocational education learning your FNM Government will: in The Bahamas ✓ Establish the National Library ✓ Enact legislation to make The Bahamas Technical and Vocational Institute (BTVI) an autonomous ✓ Initiate a Public Library System anchored by a entity with a Board comprising representatives of fully-integrated computer network supported by an the public and private sectors internet platform ✓ Provide accommodation for Family Island students ✓ Provide a line item in the National Budget for to undertake courses of study and training at BTVI Public Libraries ✓ Establish a division of BTVI in Abaco, Eleuthera ✓ Increase funding for Public Libraries and Exuma ✓ Improve collections in Community Libraries ✓ Link BTVI and the technical and vocational studies ✓ Link all national literacy programmes to the work of of high schools Public Libraries ✓ Recruit additional instructors qualifi ed to ✓ Provide a career path for librarians and improve provide technical skills training at internationally their pay scales acceptable standards ✓ Provide a National Website for all public records ✓ Invest in additional high-tech equipment and ✓ facilities to ensure world class training for Promote Library Science as a career supported by students in the 21st century government scholarships and offer government scholarships for the study of the same

11 Development Of Our Youth The FNM is committed to a new and ✓ Introduce a SelfStarters Programme to empower innovative approach to the training of young young people seeking to establish or expand Bahamians and to enhancing their life small businesses experiences. Toward this end, your FNM ✓ Provide aspiring entrepreneurs funding to acquire Government will: tools and supplies ✓ Provide through a SelfStarters Network online ✓ Strengthen and expand mentoring and research facility, business counselling and direct apprenticeship programmes for young adults training linkages to NGOs, the BTVI and the College ✓ Provide life-affi rming and enriching experiences of The Bahamas for our youth by promoting cultural awareness, ✓ Develop Community Centres, particularly in densely community service and environmental stewardship populated “Over-the-Hill” communities to: ✓ Upgrade the public library system to meet the ■ Provide adequate and suitable space for students to needs and demands of young people for ready complete homework assignments, and access to information ■ offer community activities for young persons and ✓ Expand vocational and technical training in the other members of the community government-operated school system to improve ✓ Increase support for after-school activities in the correlation between training available and sports, youth clubs, marching bands and national specialization needed in the national economy cultural organizations such as the National Youth ✓ Expand job placement and apprenticeship Choir, the National Children’s Choir, the National programmes for school leavers and recent Youth Orchestra and the National School of Dance graduates

12 “We believe, along with most enlightened people in today’s world, that access to health care is a fundamental human right. We also believe that access to health care ought not to be determined by private wealth or ability to pay.” – Hubert A. Ingraham

13 Dedicated To Restoring Trust In Government

✓ Further develop and expand comprehensive Social Agenda and integrated child health services at In keeping with the FNM belief that shaping community clinics a society in which those with the greatest need ✓ Expand and upgrade adolescent health services are granted the greatest assistance your FNM ✓ Institute new psychological and peer counseling Government will programmes designed to reduce/prevent the incidence of sexually transmitted diseases ✓ Extend National Insurance Board (NIb) Benefits including HIV/AIDS, violence, pregnancy, sexual for contributors to include unemployment abuse and obesity among teens ✓ In consultation with all stakeholders ensure that ✓ Act to cause a reduction in dental diseases affordable national health insurance is provided for all ✓ Strengthen programmes for the prevention of communicable diseases ✓ Establish a national health fund to assist with the purchase of prescription medicines for specified ✓ Intensify pest control and rodent eradication chronic illnesses programmes ✓ Implement and sustain public information ✓ Give priority to strengthening the National programmes designed to raise the awareness of Programme for Diabetes Prevention and Control the general public to the needs and rights of the ✓ Emphasize good nutrition through universal elderly and of the physically disabled application of the National Dietary Guidelines ✓ Expand programmes to assist the elderly, the ill ✓ Improve the care of cancer patients by expanding and physically disabled to more fully participate programmes for early detection and treatment and in family, school, church and other community further the development of the “Cancer Registry” activities and “Tumour Board” ✓ Expand programmes for the treatment and care of the mentally ill ✓ Implement the development of a national education Health and awareness programme on healthy ageing To enhance the quality of, and access to health ✓ Provide additional resources for the professional care, your FNM Government will: development of physicians, nurses, allied health professionals and other members of ✓ Establish a national health fund to assist with the the health team purchase of prescription medicines for specified chronic illnesses ✓ Improve health infrastructure ✓ Cause affordable health insurance to be provided to all ✓ Restore order to the procurement of vaccines, medicines and other medical supplies for the Department of Public Health community health services programmes ✓ Provide adequate resources to improve maternal and neo-natal services and to achieve an infant mortality rate below ten per thousand live births

14 We in the FNM are committed and determined to renew your trust in Government. Our policies and plans are ready. Our candidates are ready. Your FNM is ready.

We are Ready to Restore trust in Government. Pull out and display your FNM Candidates Poster Pull out and display your FNM Candidates Poster

www.freenationalmovement.org Free National Movement Candidates For the 2007 General Election

Brent Symonette Desmond Bannister Hubert Minnis Michael Barnett Elma Campbell Tommy Turnquest Carl Bethel Zhivargo Laing Jacinta Higgs Dion Foulkes St. Anne’s Carmichael Killarney Fort Charlotte Elizabeth Mt. Moriah Sea Breeze Marco City Fox Hill Mayaguana, Inagua, Crooked Island, Acklins & Long Cay (MICAL)

David Jordine Branville McCartney Sidney Collie Shandrice Woodside Rolle Kendal Wright Hubert Ingraham Raymond Rolle Alvin Smith Ella Lewis Johnley Ferguson Joshua Sears Bain and Grants Town Bamboo Town Blue Hills North Andros and the Clifton North Abaco Englerston North Eleuthera Farm Road & Centreville South Eleuthera Exuma Berry Islands

Brensil Rolle Donald Saunders Charles Maynard Verna Grant Ken Russell Majorie Johnson Neko Grant David Wallace Kwasi Thompson Michael Turnquest Larry Cartwright Earl Deveaux Garden Hills Golden Gates Golden Isles Eight Mile Rock High Rock South Andros Lucaya West End & Bimini Pineridge Kennedy Long Island & Marathon Ragged Island

Loretta Butler Turner Edison Key Byran Woodside Gladys Sands Phenton Neymour Felton Cox Reece Chipman Pauline Nairn Montagu South Abaco Pinewood Cat Island, Rum Cay South Beach St. Cecelia St. Thomas More Yamacraw & San Salvador Dedicated To Restoring Trust In Government Visit Pull out and display your FNM Candidates Poster www.freenationalmovement.org to:

✓ Volunteer to Help ✓ Join the FNM ✓ Sign up for eNews ✓ Learn more about the issues and much, much more… Health Infrastructural The Disabled Expansion Community ✓ Construct, expand and upgrade facilities at all The FNM believe that the physically disabled community health clinics are entitled to enjoy the same rights and ✓ Improve the delivery of services at community privileges of other citizens. Toward this end health clinics your FNM Government will: ✓ Construct a new community health clinic ✓ Review and update the 1999 Task Force Report in Freeport on Disability ✓ Upgrade of the Princess Margaret Hospital (PMH) ✓ Launch and sustain a campaign of awareness to include: aimed at educating the public on the rights of ■ Constructing, equipping and staffing of a new the disabled primary health care facility to provide basic primary health care to residents in the immediate vicinity of ✓ Enact Disability Legislation to acknowledge rights the PMH and grant protections to the Disabled Community ■ An expanded and upgraded Emergency Medicine ✓ Cause the completion of a National Disability Department providing separate treatment areas Register for victims of accidents and trauma and a separate ✓ Cause the integration of the National Disability paediatric emergency section Register into the public health system and the ■ Constructing, equipping and staffing of a new government-operated school system critical care block to house new operating theatres, recovery rooms and intensive care units for ✓ Ensure access to habilitation and rehabilitation medical, surgical and paediatric care programmes for the disabled community ■ Constructing, equipping and staffing of a new ✓ Require all government-operated schools and all maternal and child care wing with modern labour private schools to make school facilities safely and delivery suites, post-natal wards, Special Care accessible to the disabled Baby Units, Paediatric Wards and the provision of appropriate and adequate staffing ✓ Expand special education programmes in the government-operated school system catering to ✓ Undertake the redevelopment of the Sandilands students with Pervasive Development Disorders Rehabilitation Hospital (PDD) including Autism ✓ Undertake the redevelopment of the Rand ✓ Ensure appropriate education for the Disabled Memorial Hospital facility ✓ Ensure that the School for the Deaf is adequately ✓ Continue the redevelopment of the Princess funded and staffed Margaret Hospital into a first-class teaching medical facility ✓ Increase support for the School for the Blind ✓ Build state-of-the-art mini-hospitals in selected ✓ Ensure access to technical and vocational training Family Islands within Government-operated schools and at the BTVI for the physically, hearing and visually impaired/disabled Conditions of Service for Health ✓ Ensure that public transportation provides for the Care Professionals needs of disabled persons ✓ Improve conditions of service for all health ✓ Include within the government’s housing professional personnel including incremental programme increased housing for the disabled increases in risk allowances for health personnel ✓ Grant nurses and other health professionals parity in pay with other professionals within the public service ✓ Engage additional health care professionals

19 Dedicated To Restoring TrusT In Government

Land Ownership Urban Renewal To protect our citizens’ access to land your & Community FNM Government will: Development ✓ Review the provisions of the International Persons Landholding Act To foster and support an improved quality of life for Bahamians your FNM Government will: ✓ Revisit the tax structure payable on undeveloped Bahamian Real Estate held by foreign persons ✓ Create intergenerational programmes that honour ✓ Make Crown Lands available to Bahamians at the wisdom of our elders and make use of the gifts concessionary rates for home construction and of our youth business endeavours particularly in the Family ✓ Identify, enhance and help establish community Islands service and outreach initiatives that will enhance ✓ Discontinue the present government’s practice of community development the sale of publicly-owned lands to non-Bahamians ✓ Modernize the postal system for onward sale to other non-Bahamians solely for residential purposes City of Nassau ✓ Preserve the seabed for the Crown ✓ Accelerate the upgrade and beautifi cation of the ✓ When granting or leasing ocean or sea-front land, City of Nassau retain a Crown Reserve between the ocean/sea and the property granted for private development ✓ Promote and encourage the restoration of architecturally and historically interesting buildings ✓ Pursue policies that ensure that Bahamians are not in the City of Nassau closed out of access to prime land for residential and business purposes ✓ Provide incentives and concessions to effect the upgrade of Nassau’s traditional suburbs, including ✓ Encourage and support efforts by Bahamians to the reestablishment of high quality restaurants and retain or acquire prime residential and commercial places of entertainment attractive to residents and properties visitors alike ✓ Reduce, and where possible, bring to an end, the unauthorised occupation and development of Crown Lands ✓ Provide for the adequate staffi ng and funding of the Department of Lands and Surveys

20 Liveable Neighbourhoods ✓ Implement a programme of expansion and upgrade of neighbourhood parks, recreational and open ✓ Provide regular and sustained solid waste green spaces, seaside parks and picnic areas collection from residential neighbourhoods around New Providence including the following: ✓ Implement a sustained programme of scheduled ■ The R.M. Bailey High School Track and Field facility clearing of overgrown lots and demolition of ■ The redevelopment of the Montagu Foreshore, unsightly abandoned buildings including necessary restoration and reclamation of ✓ Implement a sustained programme of removal of the Montagu Beach, and the enhancement of the derelict vehicles and large home appliances from green area at the Montagu Foreshore neighbourhoods ■ Improve access to safe parking and restroom facilities at the Western Esplanade Beach and at ✓ Implement a planned programme of scheduled Saunders Beach road verge and sidewalk repair, maintenance and upkeep ■ Acquire or obtain access to the sea and develop public parking and restroom facilities at South ✓ Improve, put in and maintain drainage wells Beach and at Adelaide Beach and catchments in low-lying areas plagued ✓ Develop a multi-purpose park with nature trails with seasonal fl ooding and bird watching stations at Big Pond and at the ✓ Require the Bahamas Electricity Corporation former Garbage Truck Depot on Baillou Hill Road to ensure the continuous night-lighting of ✓ Develop a second multi-purpose public park, active busy commercial areas, and of all residential and passive recreational facilities, including nature neighbourhoods trails, walking paths, sand-pit play areas, tennis and ✓ Cause a reduction in traffi c congestion on the volley ball courts and a baseball fi eld at south New streets of New Providence by the accelerated Providence completion of the New Providence road corridor ✓ Facilitate the expansion of the National Park enhancement programme, and the undertaking of System by: additional road works ■ Providing a long term lease of land and marine ✓ Cause the enforcement of road traffi c laws areas to The Bahamas National Trust (BNT) for a ✓ Cause the elimination of all pit latrines and require new National Park at Fowl Cay in the Abacos the installation of indoor fl ush plumbing in all ■ Extending a long term lease of additional land residences over a 10-year period adjacent to existing National Parks at Harrold and Wilson Ponds in New Providence and parks in Central Andros and the Exumas to facilitate their Parks & Open Green Spaces development and safe accessibility to the public ✓ Develop a National Heroes Park in the City ✓ Review the plans of the Clifton National Park of Nassau Authority to ensure that the ruins of slave huts and archeological sites of Lucayan people are ✓ Make Arawak Cay and environs a cultural and stabilized, wetlands restored and the park made recreational centre accessible to the public ✓ Implement a planned programme of scheduled ✓ Collaborate with Local Government Authorities for maintenance of all public parks, open green spaces the development of appropriate open green spaces and public beaches throughout the country and parks in Family Island Communities ✓ Construct lavoratory blocks at all public parks and ✓ Implement a planned programme of scheduled cause their proper upkeep and maintenance maintenance and upkeep of public cemeteries ✓ Cause suitable garbage receptacles to be placed at ✓ Encourage and facilitate recycling appropriate locations and further cause the routine, scheduled collection of waste ✓ Transform the Botanical Gardens into a premier conservation and educational facility

21 Access to Beaches ✓ Create additional residential subdivisions in New Providence and in the Family Islands To preserve vistas to the sea and to protect ✓ Provide incentives for and partnership with Bahamians access to the beach and shoreline Bahamian property developers to construct homes your FNM Government will: and rental units throughout The Bahamas ✓ Preserve windows to the sea and easy access ✓ Cause a reduction in the cost of utility connections to beaches for the enjoyment of the public for fi rst time home-owners wherever un-alienated Crown Land exists at ✓ Enact legislation to eliminate the Stamp Tax and the sea or ocean shore recording fees associated with transferring home ✓ Pursue policies to preserve existing vistas to the mortgages between lending institutions sea and cause the creation of additional ones ✓ Provide loans, through The Bahamas Mortgage ✓ Ensure that the right of Bahamians to access to Corporation, to homeowners and landlords for the sea and beaches is enhanced repair and renovation of their properties ✓ Set aside land for the creation of public parks and ✓ Require that all new construction comply with the seaside picnic areas for the use of the public Town Planning and Building Control Regulations ✓ Ensure proper drainage, waste disposal, electricity and potable water supply are in place prior to the construction of homes in new subdivisions Housing ✓ Undertake a programme to correct defi ciencies in construction and access to utilities in government In keeping with the Free National low and medium income Government subdivisions Movement’s commitment to facilitate the developed by the PLP Government improvement of housing conditions and to ✓ Promote the use of energy effi cient construction increase Bahamian home ownership, your FNM practices so as to reduce on-going and long-term Government will: maintenance of residential properties ✓ Facilitate the construction of 3,000 affordable ✓ Require new subdivision developments to conserve homes by providing either fully-serviced lots and/or percentums of natural tree coverage newly constructed houses ✓ Cause the landscape and maintenance of ✓ Reduce the down-payment required for recreational and/or open green spaces in Government Guaranteed Home Mortgages to 5% of residential subdivisions total cost inclusive of utility connection and other ✓ Consider reinstating regulations requiring fees and charges the incorporation of rain water tanks and water ✓ Introduce a Lease to Buy option for low cost and catchments in buildings over an established medium income home buyers square footage ✓ Make Crown Land available to Bahamians at ✓ Tackle the problems associated with ghetto concessionary rates for residential development, communities by acting to systematically reduce particularly in the Family Islands substandard housing

22 ✓ Expedite the installation of main electrical supply Infrastructure to new developments, subdivisions, business and Development residential consumers ✓ Revisit the formula for the imposition of a fuel To improve public services and provide relief surcharge on Bahamas Electricity Corporation’s from traffi c congestion, fl ooding, poor roads billings. and unsafe construction practices your FNM ✓ Ensure street lighting in all neighbourhoods Government will: ✓ Discontinue the practice of using answering ✓ Commence a scheduled upgrade of the machines on customer service lines during the infrastructure of The Bahamas to 21st century normal work day standard and cause an improvement in the level of service received from the public corporations, including the upgrade of electricity and water supply to all residents Energy Policy ✓ Encourage Cable Bahamas, in collaboration with Bahamas Telecommunications Company (BTC) and Mindful of the need to pursue renewable the Broadcasting Corporation of The Bahamas, to energy sources to meet future energy needs of make ZNS television available via satellite without Bahamians your FNM Government will: charge to small cays and isolated communities ✓ Adopt policies to promote and encourage the use of renewable sources of energy, including Public Utility Corporations solar power Water & Sewerage Corporation ✓ Ensure that Government departments take the lead in utilizing more energy effi cient systems ✓ Accelerate the programme for the elimination of pit latrines in the “Over-the- Hill” area ✓ Provide incentives for the use of solar power ✓ Make sanitary all standpipes in the Over-the- ✓ Encourage the use of small vehicles and golf carts Hill area pending the completion of the urban as means of transportation on small islands and redevelopment programmes cays and within resort communities ✓ Ensure that all communities in New Providence and ✓ Reduce duty on the importation of appliances and in the Family Islands have access to potable water vehicles powered by alternative energy sources ✓ Reduce the cost of connections for fi rst time ✓ Promote the import of diesel and hybrid fueled home-owners motor vehicles to reduce engine emissions ✓ Discontinue the practice of using answering ✓ Promote energy saving practices in the machines on customer service lines during the construction of residential and commercial normal work day buildings and in the installation and use of appliances Bahamas Telecommunication Company (BTC) ✓ Complete the privatization of BTC ✓ Liberalize the telecommunications sector Roads, Ports ✓ Aggressively promote a diversifi ed telecommunications sector And Docks ✓ Ensure that BTC collaborates with the Broadcasting Corporation of The Bahamas and Cable Bahamas New Providence to facilitate, without charge, the transmission of ZNS television to all populated settlements in ✓ Complete the New Providence Road Project The Bahamas ✓ Create additional road corridors in New Providence, extending Soldier Road via Fire Trail Bahamas Electricity Corporation (BEC) Road to the Airport, and extending Cow Pen Road ✓ Explore cost effective alternative energy sources to the Coral Harbour Road for The Bahamas

23 ✓ Continue to improve road structures, signage and traffic management Civil Aviation ✓ Complete the redevelopment of the Prince George To improve scheduled airlift to The Bahamas, Wharf and related cruise ship and visitor centre strengthen social and economic linkages infrastructure between our island communities and support ✓ Accelerate the redevelopment of the Lynden and promote tourism development in the Family Pindling International Airport (LPIA) Islands your FNM Government will: ✓ Ensure that all roads are named ✓ Seek a strategic partner for Bahamasair ✓ Ensure that all buildings are numbered ✓ Ensure that the Airport Authority is adequately ✓ Ensure the regularly scheduled re-paving of major funded thoroughfares and subdivision roads ✓ Ensure that the Master Plan for the redevelopment ✓ Construct a new Straw Market and upgrade of the LPIA is implemented in a timely ✓ Upgrade facilities at the Potters Cay Dock manner ✓ Invite Bahamian entrepreneurs to partner with the Airport Authority to create a viable Duty Free Family Islands Shopping Arcade at LPIA offering both Bahamian ✓ Ensure that turning basins and channels are and international products properly maintained so as not to impede mailboat ✓ Develop conference and meeting room facilities deliveries at LPIA ✓ Continue the completion of the Hurricane ✓ Make the LPIA an efficient Hub for domestic air Restoration Project reinforcing sea walls and sea traffic to the Family Islands defences destroyed and/or damaged by hurricanes ✓ Construct a new international arrival and departure ✓ Construct new government administrative terminal at Moss Town, Exuma and upgrade the complexes where required facilities to accommodate scheduled night flights ✓ Construct all-purpose gymnasiums to serve both ✓ Install air traffic control towers at Marsh Harbour the sporting needs of selected communities and to and at Treasure Cay, Abaco serve as hurricane and emergency shelters ✓ Upgrade airport terminal facilities in Andros, ✓ Undertake a planned road and dock repair and Eleuthera, Exuma, and Long Island upgrade programme ✓ Construct new airport terminals at Treasure Cay ✓ Upgrade airports and/or terminal facilities in and Marsh Harbour, Abaco and The Bight, selected Family Islands Cat Island ✓ Accelerate the completion of the programme put in ✓ Bring airports in Abaco, Eleuthera, Exuma and place by the last FNM Government to improve solid San Salvador up to ICAO and FAA standards waste disposal facilities ✓ Commence a programme of restoration of cemeteries ✓ Cause strict observance of zoning and building regulations ✓ Replace the Glass Window Bridge in North Eleuthera with a suitable causeway ✓ Replace the quarry causeway between Little and Great Abaco with a bridge ✓ Create new subdivisions with required infrastructure for the orderly expansion of communities ✓ Cause all government buildings to be made more accessible to the disabled

24 25 Dedicated To Restoring TrusT In Government

Local Government Family Island In Grand Bahama Development So as to fulfi ll its commitment of sustainable ✓ Further empower Local Government development in our Family Islands your FNM ✓ Ensure that all services provided by the Government will: Government of The Bahamas are accessible in and from Grand Bahama ✓ Strengthen local government ✓ Promote low-impact, eco-friendly development In the Family Islands ✓ Complete the programme for the installation of night lights for scheduled and other aircraft at airports in ✓ Strengthen local government and give more Abaco, Eleuthera, Exuma and San Salvador responsibility to elected Councils ✓ Undertake a sustained programme of infrastructural ✓ Collaborate with Local Government on all matters upgrade and expansion to include improved airport relating to disaster preparedness and response and docking facilities, new school construction, and ✓ Modernize and restructure the postal system so expansion of the health infrastructure that letters posted in one community in a Family ✓ Undertake road and sea defence restoration and Island to another community in the same Family enhancement works Island are not required to go to Nassau ✓ Put in place suitable solid waste disposal facilities ✓ Collaborate with Local Government and the private to meet needs sector for the upgrading and beautifi cation of Family Island settlements ✓ Complete the installation of water systems ✓ Consult Local Government on all matters affecting ✓ Make Crown Land accessible to Bahamians on the community concessionary terms for resort, industrial and agricultural purposes In New Providence ✓ Strengthen the tourism sector ✓ Extend incentives and concessions in support of ✓ Introduce elected local government in Bahamian-owned tourism-related businesses such New Providence as small hotels, guest houses and eco-resorts ✓ Regulate and license foreign-owned second homes offered for short-term rentals

26 ✓ Promote more scheduled airlift Environment ✓ Encourage and support light manufacturing, agriculture, fi sheries and food processing And Sustainable industries with special emphasis on fostering improvement in production, processing, Development marketing, sales and management To ensure the environmental sustainability ✓ Review Fisheries Regulations especially as they of development in our country your FNM relate to sports and recreational fi shing by visitors Government will: ✓ Provide advisory services and other support for ✓ Adopt and implement policies to protect and small Bahamian entrepreneurs enhance our environment ✓ Expand and simplify the Government Loan ✓ Respect the environment as the real basis of our Guarantee Programme in support of small country’s wealth Bahamian businesses ✓ Launch an ongoing and extensive education and information programme to sensitize citizens to our natural environment Grand Bahama ✓ Initiate programmes to strengthen vulnerable coastal areas Development ✓ Enact legislation to further protect coral reefs, sea The FNM views Grand Bahama as the grass beds and mangroves industrial capital of The Bahamas, a signifi cant ✓ Increase marine protected areas to better preserve second city given its population size, level of our marine biodiversity development and contribution to national life. ✓ Encourage mariculture projects to augment the Your FNM Government will: increasing demand for seafood ✓ Increase government funding to The Bahamas ✓ Pursue policies that promote and facilitate National Trust continued diversifi cation of the economy ✓ Reconstitute The Bahamas Environment Science ✓ Support the industrial sector so as to facilitate the and Technology Commission (BEST) as an kind of expansion in that sector of the economy independent statutory authority experienced between 1992 and 2002 ✓ Stop the present assault on the environmental ✓ Promote Grand Bahama as a fi rst class sea and integrity of the country resulting from indiscriminate air container transshipment centre dumping, unsightly abandoned buildings, derelict ✓ Determine the appropriate levels and kinds of vehicles, excavation of hills and back-fi lling of support required to promote and encourage the wetlands revitalization of the agricultural sector ✓ Encourage the landscape of private properties ✓ Collaborate with the Port Authority and ✓ Require that all new construction comply with the with investors in the tourism sector so as to Town Planning and Building Control Regulations effectively promote the island’s resorts and facilities internationally ✓ Ensure that proper drainage, waste disposal, electricity and potable water supplies are in ✓ Foster improved linkages between economic place prior to the construction of homes in new sectors subdivisions ✓ Ensure that the highest standards are observed ✓ Retain the ownership of all Government-owned by all developers so as to safeguard the water-bearing lands as part of the Bahamian environment from further degradation patrimony ✓ Provide advisory services and other support ✓ Enact legislation for the regulation and the for small Bahamian entrepreneurs provision of guidelines for Environmental Impact ✓ Expand and simplify the Government Loan Assessments for all developers Guarantee Programme in support of small Bahamian businesses

27 ✓ Carry out Social Impact Assessments of all major ✓ Mount a sustained public education programme developments on disaster preparedness and response ✓ Encourage the incorporation of rain water tanks ✓ Require the strict observance of the Building Code and water catchments in buildings over an ✓ Amend the Town Planning Act and Regulations established square footage to strengthen restrictions on construction along ✓ Plant sea oats and other indigenous plants to vulnerable coastlines and in other dangerously protect sand dunes and other fragile coastal zones low lying, fl ood-prone areas. ✓ Develop a coordinated National Emergency Response Programme to involve all broadcast media in the country in the event of disasters Disaster Preparedness ✓ Provide training to local government authorities and selected community based groups to enable them And Response to act as fi rst responders following a disaster To better provide improved protection and ✓ Require schools to conduct periodic disaster quick response to disasters, both manmade and preparedness drills with staff and students natural, your FNM Government will: ✓ Develop a Disaster Preparedness and Response ✓ Review and amend legislation governing the Manual to be followed by Public Offi cers in National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) preparation for or following any national disaster so as to streamline bureaucracy and ensure the ✓ Establish a Hurricane and Disaster Insurance Fund responsiveness of the agency at times of disasters to assist farmers and fi shermen who suffer severe ✓ Establish a separate modern Fire Department losses as a result of disasters ✓ Develop Volunteer Fire Services in Family Island Communities ✓ Develop a network of all-purpose gymnasiums in the Family Islands able to serve as emergency shelters for residents in case of hurricanes or other calamitous events

2 29 Dedicated To Restoring TrusT In Government

✓ Establish a Bahamian ShowPlace where Bahamian Heritage entertainers, writers, artists, artisans and musicians To conserve and promote our natural and can exhibit, and interact with music producers, historical heritage for our own benefi t and as publishers, agents, distributors, wholesale buyers and media houses attractions for visitors the FNM Government will: ✓ Position The Bahamas as a premier destination for ✓ Provide life-affi rming and self-enriching Cultural Festivals year round experiences by promoting cultural awareness ✓ Ensure that the Bahamian fl avour of Regatta is ✓ Complete the establishment of the following key maintained in its various dimensions cultural institutions: ✓ Increase the promotion of Regattas internationally ■ The National Library ✓ Promote the ecological and historical attractions ■ The National Museum in New Providence and in the Family Islands as ■ The National Centre for The Performing Arts attractions to visitors and residents alike ■ The National Junkanoo Expo ✓ Promote the development of museums and art ✓ Provide support for the further development of the galleries in all Family Islands National Art Gallery ✓ Increase support to the National School of Dance ✓ Restore Fort Montagu, Fort Fincastle and Fort ✓ Increase Support to the National Youth Choir and Charlotte, making them the centrepieces of a the National Children’s Choir broader historic-tourism programme ✓ Encourage and support the conservation of historical buildings and of artifacts in accordance with the provisions of the Monuments, Museums and Antiquities Act Sports & Leisure ✓ Promote and expand the National Arts Festival In keeping with the FNM’s belief that sport ✓ Promote and increase funding for the National and leisure are integral to a healthy, happy Endowment for the Arts population, your FNM Government will: ✓ Provide funding for the development of cultural ✓ Establish a National Sports Authority to promote the programmes for television and radio development of sport in The Bahamas ✓ Make Arawak Cay a major Cultural Festival site ✓ After consultation with sporting organizations and for the enjoyment of Bahamian families and sports persons, articulate a 10-year plan for the visitors alike development of sports in the country

30 ✓ Promote sport as an activity important for the ✓ Pursue a foreign policy in consultation with health of the population our CARICOM partners but determined by ✓ Increase government funding to national sporting time-honoured positions of self-determination, organizations sovereignty, mutual respect and non-intervention, and in support of our national economic and ✓ Complete the Grand Bahama Sports complex development goals ✓ Construct gymnasiums and/or sports complexes in ✓ Continue to advocate for greater international selected Family Islands intervention in the resolution of the continuing ✓ Engage increased numbers of experienced Haitian social and political crisis sports coaches, including those with international ✓ Provide leadership within the international experience, to assist in the training of young community relating to issues impacting small athletes island states and small economies ✓ Accelerate the construction of the National ✓ Continue negotiations on the Delimitation of Sports Stadium in New Providence The Bahamas Maritime Boundaries with ✓ Expand the network of community parks and neighbouring countries provide for the installation, maintenance and ✓ Continue to participate in international dialogue upkeep of the parks’ recreational facilities and negotiations impacting international initiatives ✓ Construct two major community parks in New in the fi ght against the traffi c in illicit drugs, human Providence, one at the former dump truck depot on smuggling and the fi nancing of terrorism Baillou Hill Road and Big Pond to include walking ✓ Remain in the forefront of international discussions and running paths and bird lookout-towers, and on Climate Change and sea-level rise the other on East Street South adjacent to the C.V. Bethel High School, to include active and passive ✓ Accede to and/or ratify United Nations Conventions recreational spaces including volley ball courts, which strengthen our profi le as a democratic, baseball fi eld, walking and running paths, rest responsible member of the international community areas, and sandpit playgrounds ✓ Ratify the United Nations Convention Against ✓ Set aside land for the development of seaside Corruption picnic and recreational spaces in New Providence, Grand Bahama and the Family Islands Consular Matters ✓ Protect and enhance public access to good quality beaches ✓ Computerise the Passport Offi ce ✓ Develop a plan for the commercial and recreational ✓ Issue machine readable passports with improved development of Arawak Cay anti-fraud features ✓ Establish regulations governing the use of deed polls in applying for passports ✓ Implement the previous FNM Government policy International decision to permit consular missions to issue passports to entitled Bahamian citizens living in Relations their jurisdictions So as to enhance the standing of The Bahamas ✓ Computerise the Visitors Visa Unit internationally and to advance the interests of ✓ Issue visitors visas with enhanced anti-fraud our country regionally and internationally your features FNM Government will: ✓ Conclude bilateral visa abolition agreements with ✓ Acquire suitable accommodation to house the selected countries to facilitate visitor travel to The Ministry of Foreign Affairs Bahamas and Bahamian travel internationally ✓ Accredit resident and non-resident Bahamian Ambassadors to all countries with which diplomatic relations have been established ✓ Continue to participate in regional, hemispheric and international organizations including CARICOM, the OAS, the Commonwealth and the United Nations

31 The Bahamas Foreign Service ✓ Establish a Policy, Planning and Development Unit in the Public Service Commission ✓ Enact Foreign Service legislation for the ✓ Establish an Organization and Management Unit Foreign Service in the Department of Public Service to reshape ✓ Make The Bahamas Foreign Service an Government Ministries and Departments and approved authority develop new structures and administrative ✓ Amend the Parliamentary Elections Act to permit processes associated with a modern Public serving entitled officers to vote in local and national Sector elections ✓ Review the Public Service Pension Act ✓ Review the operations of our diplomatic and ✓ Develop an Institute of Public Service to facilitate consular offices to ensure adequate funding and the participation of public officers in continuing appropriate staff levels to pursue our interests education internationally ✓ Amend the Parliamentary Elections Act to permit serving entitled Bahamians and other registered Improving Delivery of Services from Bahamian voters to vote in national elections the Public Sector ✓ Conclude bi-lateral agreements for the reciprocal ✓ Enact legislation for the appointment of employment of spouses of diplomatic and consular an Ombudsman officers with countries where The Bahamas has ✓ Modernize and restructure the postal system established diplomatic/consular presence to deliver more services efficiently including ✓ Acquire additional residential properties overseas establishment of mail-sorting stations in the Family for the accommodation of Bahamas Foreign Islands; purchase of postage stamps on-line; Service Officers and Bahamas Diplomatic and provision of one-stop payment centres for public Consular Offices utility and cable service ✓ Pursue the development in The Bahamas of international bulk mail delivery depots ✓ Increase the number of public services available Public Sector Reform on-line including all application forms with regard So as to provide more efficient and effective to business licences, passports and visas, and delivery of services to members of the general customs clearance public your FNM Government will: ✓ Create an efficient system for obtaining business licenses ✓ Resume public sector reforms interrupted in 2002 ✓ Banish answering machines from all public ✓ Complete the computerization of the Public Service sector entities, including public corporation ✓ Complete the review and modernization of the customer service Public Service Commission Regulations ✓ Improve the management practices at the network ✓ Complete, update and modernize General Orders of community health clinics to better meet the needs of the population ✓ Populate the Teaching Service Commission ✓ Modernize and integrate the system of registering ✓ Promote the development of centres of excellence births and deaths in the Public Service ✓ Link the register of deaths with the Office of the ✓ Introduce modern management and organizational Parliamentary Commissioner, the NIB and the practices in the public sector Public Treasury ✓ Keep career paths and terms of remuneration of ✓ Modernize and integrate immigration systems public officers under review ✓ Introduce machine readable passports ✓ Eliminate and/or reduce anomalies in the salary scales of public officers

32 “We in the FNM are bound together by a resolve and a determination to restore trust to government; to make life better for all Bahamians regardless to where they reside in our country, regardless to their station in life, regardless to the level of their formal education and regardless to their skin colour or ethnicity. Ours is a large tent with room for all Bahamians.” – Hubert A. Ingraham

33 Relations With The Media The FNM believes strongly in and supports ✓ Provide funding for public broadcasting following free and independent media. Your FNM the formulas adopted in other countries like the Government will: United States (PBS) and the United Kingdom (BBC) involving a dynamic mix of government funding, ✓ Reinstitute the practice of access to the corporate sponsorships and an endowment fund government by the media and complete the ✓ Provide adequate funding so that BCB is able to liberation and modernization of the broadcast hire talent and source out a variety of production media begun in our first term activities to independent technicians, producers ✓ Enact Freedom of Information legislation and content providers ✓ Give greater access to the public airwaves by a ✓ Bring an end to political interference in and variety of voices manipulation of the public broadcasting network ✓ Ensure that Government-owned media does not ✓ Cause the BCB to become a producer of local compete with private enterprise in what is a limited programming, using the works of Bahamian commercial radio and television market in The writers, directors, artists, musicians, producers Bahamas and technicians ✓ Transform the Broadcasting Corporation of The ✓ Encourage the BCB to develop programming in Bahamas (BCB) into a 21st century multimedia areas of national interest which require limited corporation managed under the direction of a government involvement, such as the preservation Board and encompassing commercial-free public and promotion of Bahamian heritage and culture, television and radio broadcasting national unity, social development, education, ✓ Delegate to the BCB Board responsibility for public health, national security, constitutional and the selection of top management, removing that legal rights, disaster preparedness and consumer function from partisan politics protection

34 The FNM Record Of Trust 1992-2002 The FNM’s record is one of trust and achievement and included: 1. Restoring the good name of The Bahamas internationally 2. Deepening our democracy by: ■ Freeing the airwaves ■ Causing the television broadcast of Parliamentary Debate ■ Introducing elected local government in the Family Islands ■ Introducing transparency in application processes for public services, licences and permits ■ Eliminating the need for Bahamian applicants for a licence to do business in Freeport to be politically vetted in Nassau 3. Creating a strong economy by: ■ Restoring fiscal responsibility to government accounting ■ Resuscitating the tourism and hotel sectors of the economy ■ Strengthening the legal framework for the financial services sector ■ Encouraging major diversification projects such as the container transshipment port and the ship repair facility ■ Putting in place the infrastructure, and introducing policies and legislation to foster development in the Family Islands 4. Attracting record levels of foreign investment 5. Increasing Bahamian ownership in the economy 6. Halving unemployment and adopting progressive labour legislation 7. Upgrading our infrastructure: ■ Completing the electrification of all Family Island communities ■ Repaving hundreds of miles of highway and settlement roads throughout New Providence and the Family Islands ■ Commencing the replacement of water mains and the upgrade of well-fields and pumping stations around the country ■ Introducing a schedule of repairs to Family Island airports and docks 8. Pursuing enlightened social policies 9. Reducing class sizes in the public school system by constructing 12 new schools and substantially redeveloping 20 others 10. Making health care better and more accessible by building nine new community health care centres and commencing the redevelopment and upgrade of the Princess Margaret Hospital, the Sandilands Rehabilitation Hospital and the Rand Memorial Hospital. 11. Establishing the Industrial Tribunal including a Grand Bahama Division 12. Improving public services 13. Increasing the size of the Supreme Court and establishing the Supreme Court in Grand Bahama 14. Upgrading and increasing sporting and recreational facilities 15. Enhancing environmental protection and doubling the size of the national park system 16. Adopting policies to improve immigration application processes to combat illegal immigration

35 The Free National Movement Is Ready To Make Tomorrow Better For All Standards In Public Life The Free National Movement strongly believes that the traditions and institutions of a democracy are the most precious of a nation’s assets. The Free National Movement believe that it is the personal responsibility of every Member of Parliament to maintain those standards of conduct that the Parliament and the public are entitled to expect, to protect the good name of Parliament and to advance the people’s interest. Similar standards of conduct are also expected of senior public officers, whose responsibility it is to implement the laws of The Bahamas and the policy directives of Cabinet. Accordingly, Members of Parliament and all those who hold public office are expected to observe seven general principles of conduct which apply to all persons in public life.

The Seven Principles Of Public Life 1. Selflessness Holders of public office should take decisions solely on the basis of the public interest. They should not do so in order to gain financial or other material benefits for themselves, members of their family, or their friends. 2. Integrity Holders of public office should not place themselves under any financial or other obligation to individuals or organizations that might compromise them in the performance of their official duties. 3. Objectivity In carrying out public business, including making public appointments, awarding contracts, or recommending individuals for rewards and benefits, holders of public office should make choices on merit. 4. Accountability Holders of public office are accountable to the public for their decisions and actions and must submit themselves to scrutiny appropriate to their office. 5. Openness Holders of public office must be open about all the decisions and actions that they take. They should give reasons for their decisions and restrict information only when the wider public interest clearly so demands. 6. Honesty Holders of public office have an obligation to declare any private interests relating to their public duties and to take steps to resolve any conflicts in a way that protects the public interest. 7. Leadership Holders of public office should promote and support these principles by leadership and example.

36 Standards Of Conduct For Ministers Of Government The Free National Movement believe that Ministers of Government must be held to the highest standards of constitutional and personal conduct. In particular they must observe the following principles of Ministerial conduct: ✓ Ministers must ensure that no conflict arises, or appears to arise, between their public duties and their private interests. ✓ Ministers are accountable to Parliament for the policies and operations of their departments and agencies. ✓ Ministers must not mislead Parliament. They must be open with Parliament and with the public. ✓ Ministers must avoid accepting any gift or hospitality, which might appear to compromise their judgement or place them under improper obligation. ✓ Ministers in the House of Assembly must separate their roles as Ministers, Members of Parliament and Party Representative.

Dedicated To Restoring Trust In Government www.freenationalmovement.org

FNM Headquarters: 144 Mackey Street Nassau, The Bahamas

PO Box N10713 Nassau, The Bahamas

Telephone/Fax Numbers: Telephone: 1 (242) 393-7853/393-7863 Fax: 1 (242) 393-7914

Press/Media Enquiries: The Press Officer E-mail: [email protected] Telephone: (242) 359-5842

General Enquiries: [email protected]