'Dems' Had Fully Embraced Mr Arthur
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INSIDENEWSINSIDENEWSEDITORIALA2 TODAYA8TODAYA2 TODAY8TODAY2 Monday, February 5, 2018 Page 2 TODAY’S EDITORIAL If only the ‘Dems’ had fully embraced Mr“Barbados is in aArthur position where there is a definite craving for leadership and clarity. It is therefore good for people to feel that freedom to move across the divide because at the end of the day we are too small a country to, because someone is a Dee [member of the Democratic Labour Party], they are an idiot or because I am Bee [BLP], I am smart. TODAY IN BARBADOS There has to be more to it than that.” Prominent Queen’s Counsel Andrew Pilgrim, reacting over a year ago to news that former Prime Minister Owen Arthur had accepted June 15 deadline for completion of sexual harassment policies an offer to lead Government’s economic advisory team. It was just over two years ago that an official offer was made by Minister of Finance Employers are being reminded that they have until June 15 to have their policies in place, as Chris Sinckler on behalf of the Freundel Stuart administration to former Prime Minister required under the Employment Sexual Harassment (Prevention) Act. Owen Arthur to serve as Government’s chief economic advisor. The Act was proclaimed on December 15, 2017. At that time the economy was performing, by Central Bank estimates, at well below Employers must have completed the written policies and presented their employees with copies, one per cent growth annually, with the deficit in excess of six per cent of gross domestic within six months of its commencement. product (GDP), the island’s foreign reserves below the required 12 weeks of import Section 4 (5) of the Act warns that business owners who fail to comply with the deadline are cover and Government up the proverbial creek. guilty of an offence and are liable on summary conviction to a fine of $5,000, imprisonment of 12 By then, Mr Arthur, the former leader of the Barbados Labour Party, was sitting months or both. (BGIS) as an independent member of Parliament, and on the basis of his economic track record alone, he was asked to replace the retiring Sir Frank Alleyne as head of its “independent” advisory council, which was first impaneled by late Prime Minister David Thompson back in 2008, to both review and recommend economic policy for the final approval of Cabinet. Mr Arthur, then 66, had willingly agreed to accept the offer to head the 14-member council, knowing full well it would raise national eyebrows, but equally too that the TODAY’S CONTACTS economic challenges confronting the country were very serious. “Clearly, it [the offer] says that they [the Government] think I have something to offer,” he had told Barbados TODAY at the time, while revealing that he had also been Peter Harris: Chairman approached earlier by Senator Darcy Boyce to work with Government on the Caribbean [email protected] Commission on the Economy. Kaymar Jordan: Editor-In-Chief But lo and behold politics got in the way, and certain forces within the ruling [email protected] Democratic Labour Party (DLP) were so riled up over the prospect of doing things ‘the Arthur way’ that they would do their utmost to ensure that the arrangement never saw Sandy Deane: Editorial Coordinator the light of day. MULTIMEDIA [email protected] Kwame McDowall: For these spectacular DLP yardfowls, who would find fellowship with an equally Multimedia Specialist specular group of bitter Bees who were still seething over Mr Arthur’s decision to Wade Gibbons: Sports Coordinator [email protected] quit the BLP, it was simply too much to accept that the same stone which the builders [email protected] rejected would now become the head cornerstone. Indeed, they had by then become accustomed to publicly vilifying Mr Arthur over his IT AND GRAPHICS said policies; therefore they would determine that it was much easier to continue to curse Henry Richards: and mock him at every turn - to the point of even wishing he were dead - than to yield REPORTERS Creative and Technical Manager Emmanuel Joseph: Senior Reporter [email protected] to any of his advice. [email protected] What a shame, especially given the fact that we are now worse off economically than Shamar Blunt: IT Officer we were two years ago, even after Government would have laid off 3,000 plus public Fernella Wedderburn: Senior Reporter servants, and piled on taxes on top of taxes in its last two Budgets in particular. [email protected] [email protected] With the reserves now at their lowest level in 22 years at $410 million, or 6.6 weeks of import cover, and our national debt still at the dangerously high level of over 100 per Colville Mounsey: Senior Reporter SUB-EDITORS cent of GDP, one cannot help but wonder whether we would have been in such a sorry [email protected] Jamelia Benskin: Chief Sub-Editor state had our Government not opted for political expediency at a time when the country [email protected] seemingly needed ‘Arthur more than ever’. Marlon Madden: Senior Reporter Like him or loathe not, he was the Prime Minister who led us through 14 years of [email protected] Stefon Jordan economic growth. [email protected] And when we peel away all of the political tomfoolery, his economic experience and Morissa Lindsay Bionca Manrow competence are unparalleled nationally for weathering a major economic storm of the [email protected] [email protected] magnitude of the one we are currently facing. It is therefore disappointing to say the very least to hear the Stuart administration - Katrina King after two years of impassioned and well-reasoned appeals by Mr Arthur for this or that [email protected] PHOTOGRAPHERS action to be taken - now seeming to finally come around to his way of thinking on the Anmar Goodridge-Boyce Amory Alleyne way out. [email protected] Kemar Holder After ignoring Mr Arthur’s warnings, we have lived to hear Mr Sinckler, in virtually the same words as the former Prime Minister, caution us last week that not only is there Haroon Greenidge need for an urgent national discourse on the economy, but that our complete list of SALES MANAGER Remy Rock social entitlements must be reviewed and that it cannot be business as usual within our David Williams 63 state-owned enterprises, which have been benefiting from over $1 billion a year in [email protected] Government transfers. To our surprise Mr Sinckler, who has been the key henchman of this Government, has also seemingly come around to Mr Arthur’s thinking, and that of other well- respected economists, that there can be no running away from the question of a formal arrangement with the International Monetary Fund. The only caveat issued by Mr Sinckler, who has been bitterly opposed publically to such a suggestion up until now, ADDRESS: Suite F3, Building 3, Manor Lodge Complex, Lodge Hill, St. Michael was that such a move would have to come with a new mandate from the people. Website: www.barbadostoday.bb It begs the question, how much further ahead would we have been today Telephone 246-417-1000 economically had we heeded the wisdom of Mr Arthur and others of like mind? * For general news queries email [email protected] or [email protected]. As far ahead perhaps as Grenada, which took on board his advice over the past two For all advertising enquires email [email protected]. years and are now well on the road to recovery. We have to agree with Mr Pilgrim that our country is in too much of a volatile economic position for its best resources to be ignored strictly on party political grounds..