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I hope WE Have A Plan

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Adrian Loveridge - Hotel Owner
Submitted by Adrian Loveridge – Hotel Owner

In less than two months we will see the arrival of two new air services. Factually the return of one from Philadelphia (US Airways) and a brand new addition, JetBlue from New York!

There is no doubt in my mind that JetBlue aggressive pricing will drive new business, even though American Airlines were quick to match fares on certain routes. Competition has certainly worked with the arrival of WestJet from Canada. But in many respects the United States for us, is a difference market and even before the current global economic crisis, it has not really seen any significant or sustained growth over the last six years or so.

It’s been a great puzzle to me for sometime why an increasingly disproportionate percentage of the BTA annual budget is consistently spent on this market with no real growth achieved.

The CTO (Caribbean Tourism Organisation) figures speak for themselves. Long stay US visitor arrivals to Barbados were for 2003 (129,326), 2004 (129,664), 2005 (131,005), 2006 (130,767), 2007 (134,041) and 2008 (131,003).

JetBlue are scheduled to operate Airbus 320’s with 150 seats daily, so a massive 54,750 seat capacity annually. US Airways return initially with four times a week from October and then daily from December using an Airbus 319 with 124 seat capacity.

Depending what happens after the peak season this will add another 29,760 to 42,160 seats annually. So nearly another 100,000 seats a year from a market that has not experienced a increase of more than 3,274 long stay visitor arrivals in in any one of the last six years.

A new advertising agency was appointed in North America early this year and maybe they have some spectacular plans that those of us in tourism are not aware of yet. Despite a late booking pattern, two months is still a very short window of opportunity and I really hope we can maximise this wonderful opportunity.

As someone that tries to follow tourism closely, I have frankly been surprised not to receive details inviting hoteliers and tourism players onto road shows, travel agency and tour operator visits or in fact any promotional activities that include the service providers to the JetBlue and US Airways gateways and connecting cities.

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53 responses to “I hope WE Have A Plan”

  1. David Avatar
    David

    @Adrian L

    Given your brief tenure on the BTA Board do you have a sense we have the mix of people to do the job?

  2. Adrian Loveridge Avatar
    Adrian Loveridge

    David,

    To give you an absolutely truthful answer, clearly we do NOT, otherwise there would be no need (or desire) to restructure.
    The status quo takes far too long to get meaningful things done.
    Tourism is a dynamic industry that is constantly changing and to take advantage of every emerging opportunity you need either people or an organisation who can respond in an equally timely manner.

    Having said that both the BTA and the current board have some highly motivated people.

    The US is a classic example, an average of less than 1.3% growth annually in long stay visitors over a seven year period.

    Its been allowed to go on for far too long without measures being put in place to redress the situation.

  3. David Avatar
    David

    Here is the latest statistics on the state of tourist arrivals in Barbados compiled by the Caribbean Tourism Organization. The numbers are not pretty.

  4. peltdownman Avatar
    peltdownman

    Adrian
    Surely, before you go looking for a market, you should have a product. How is Barbados going about defining its tourism product? Can we just say that “Brand Barbados” is good enough, and that cash-strapped potential visitors should come rushing in just for that? As far as I can see, for that past 10-15 years, we have been hearing weekly about how Barbados depends on foreign exchange brought in by visitors, yet strangely, little or nothing has been done to improve the “product”. We read on another thread that nothing has been done to prevent groynes causing beach erosion on the west coast. Also, nothing is being done to preserve what could become a world-reowned nature sanctuary at Graeme Hall. Nothing is being done to stop the filthing-up of the island with garbage. You know where I am going here. Somehow, we seem to expect visitors to come here without doing anything extra for the additional dollars that they will have to spend to do so. Look at the west coast at Holetown. There is boarding for over 1/2 km on the sea side of the road from Divi heritage to the Beach House, which I suspect will be there for another 3 years at least. A concrete monstrosity is being erected at Lime Grove which is completely out of sync. with the Holetown environment – our next white elephant. The sea there is unswimmable after a rain storm. But it doesn’t matter, because we have a “world class” golf course which nobody but the super rich is allowed to play on, but which we use in our advertising. Surely, it is time to break up our tourism product into “product lines” with dedicated teams allocated to each product line. By “product lines”, I mean “Beach and Fun”, “Sports Tourism”, “Heritage and Eco-Tourism”, Conference and Convention Tourism”, and so on. The units dedicated to each of these product lines will be responsible for ensuring that the necessary infrastructure is in place for each one, and for the speciality marketing required for each one. It doesn’t take a genius to think these things through, just the will to get off our collective backsides. With Cuba and the Dominican Republic offering good value for money, we either act or we will be deluged by a tsunami of empty beds.

    Reply

  5. Jack Bowman Avatar
    Jack Bowman

    This link from BU, from a commenter on BU who has views implicitly endorsed by “the BU family”, is worth noting.

    http://bajan.wordpress.com/2009/07/28/homosexuality-maybe-linked-to-our-ancestral-experience/#comment-98876

    When the views of Mr. Negroman, published by BU, reach the Canadian media tomorrow, will BU be able to claim to have had a direct impact on “airlift” from Canada?

    Who knows?

  6. David Avatar
    David

    @Peltdownman

    Isn’t your suggestion the reason why the BTA underwent a restructure ie. product and marketing?

    By Adrian’s own admission the global market place is changing shouldn’t we expect the structure which we use to support the tourist product to change as well?

  7. Jack Bowman Avatar
    Jack Bowman

    Perhaps I should be more specific about this blog’s prospects of inducing Canadian “airlift”. A frequent commenter on this blog, Mr Negroman, had these things to say about the recent murder of a Canadian tourist in Barbados:

    “Yes I said murdered Canadian tourist Mr [sic] Schwarzfeld is white trash.I make no apologies for calling her that. … Mrs Schwarzfeld in the eyes of Negroman is nothing but white trash.”

    Several questions were posed to Mr Negroman regarding his opinion that Mrs Schwarzfeld was simply human garbage.

    That discussion is available here: http://bajan.wordpress.com/2009/07/28/homosexuality-maybe-linked-to-our-ancestral-experience/#comment-98899

    You have been told.

    Barbados Underground is giving space to a known racist who considers a murdered Canadian tourist, murdered in Barbados, as “white trash”.

    When the next white tourist dies, where shall we look?

  8. Bush Tea Avatar
    Bush Tea

    What plan what!??

    I think that peltdownman said it well, we have been planning exactly like the WICB….. swiping and hoping for the best…

  9. peltdownman Avatar
    peltdownman

    David
    A structure to support the tourist product is all well and fine once we have a product that we can identify. What is Barbados’ tourism product…….anyone?

  10. David Avatar
    David

    Here is how Totally Barbados answers your question.

    The key elements of Barbados’ tourism product are its:
    » Solid historical and cultural legacy
    » Political stability
    » Friendly people
    » Varied entertainment
    » Natural physical attributes

  11. Jack Bowman Avatar
    Jack Bowman

    @ Bush Tea

    Quoting Bush Tea: “I think that peltdownman said it well, we have been planning exactly like the WICB”

    Fine.

    Do you think that Mrs. Schwarzfeld, a Canadian tourist murdered on a Barbadian beach, was simply human garbage, as Mr Negroman does?

  12. Avatar
    Anonymous

    It was sad about the Canadian woman, but you all are off the radar as some Englsih people were brutally attacked in a Tobago. T&T guest house on Sunday night. You are in a position now to be the best destination in the area.

  13. Bush Tea Avatar
    Bush Tea

    Do you note the lack of any serious element of planning in the key elements listed David?
    Planning involves having a vision of the future and setting (and achieving) goals and objectives based on that vision of a desired future.

    ….swiping is much easier.

  14. Fair Play Avatar
    Fair Play

    Jack Bowman

    What do you want David to do about one person who states their opinion? Canadians also understand about freedom of speech.

    Most Visitors know that is not the attitude of the majority of Bajans.
    Thousands of tourists interact with Barbadians daily and know that they are a very friendly people.

    You should stop trying to bring to people’s attention the bad things that one person said and speak to the topic of how we could improve our tourism.

    You are behaving like the people over at BFP who seem intent on pulling Barbados down by sensitizing the world that Barbados is this great corrupt society.

    If you are Barbadians you are doing a great job at it.

  15. Bonny Peppa Avatar
    Bonny Peppa

    Jack Ass Bowman
    Wait, you over here making an idiot of yourself too? You like a ‘bile pun a pile’.

  16. Technician Avatar
    Technician

    Well said Fair Play!

  17. Avatar
    Anonymous

    So Negroman expresses some incredulous (and for many ~ offensive) views but does that justify Jack Bowman’s repeated and insensitive use of the Schwarzfeld family name and the sad memory of their late relative?

    Bowman wants to excoriate Negroman for his opinions but does that at the expense of a family who has not declared any willingness to be part of such a depressingly vulgar exchange.

    Bowman may believe that he is achieving some kind of moral victory over Negroman. Ironically that may only be a pyrrhic victory.

  18. Jack Bowman Avatar
    Jack Bowman

    @ Fair Play

    Quoting Fair Play: “You should stop trying to bring to people’s attention the bad things that one person said and speak to the topic of how we could improve our tourism.”

    Bullshit. We should turn a merciless spotlight on Barbadian racism and tell every single potential Canadian visitor that Barbados Underground endorses the view that any murdered Canadian tourist in Barbados is “white trash”.

    Best wishes.

  19. Avatar
    Anonymous

    Does “silence” equate to endorsement? Some opinions are so irrational and wrong that these are evidence only of the irrationality and pathological weirdness of the person expressing the opinions. What is achieved by responding to such opinions other than to give them undeserved attention? It would be irrational to believe that the mind of the person expressing distressing opinions could be changed by engagement in “debate”.

  20. Jack Bowman Avatar
    Jack Bowman

    @ Yet another boring “Anonymous” (YABA)

    Quoting Yaba: “So Negroman expresses some incredulous (and for many ~ offensive) views”

    First, you don’t mean “incredulous”. The meaning of “incredulous” is no more than five key-strokes away.

    Second, I hope you don’t mean “offensive”. It’s such a mealy-mouthed word, like “inappropriate”. I hope what you mean is something like repugnant, or repellant, or disgraceful or shameful or dishonourable or pathetic or infantile.

    And I hope that anyone confronted with repugnant comments would call them repugnant, would take action to make plain that the comments are repugnant.

    Hope this helps, Yaba.

  21. J Avatar
    J

    Fair Play wrote “You are behaving like the people over at BFP who seem intent on pulling Barbados down by sensitizing the world that Barbados is this great corrupt society.”

    True that BFP spends a lot of time making it seem that Barbados is the worse place in the world.

    But Jack Bowman is not “puling Barbados down” He is pointing out (correctly) that Negroman is a racist.

    David does not have to give space to Negroman’s racist rants. David can (and should) exercise editorial responsibility.

  22. J Avatar
    J

    Negroman is a sub-literate racist, and a disgrace to any educational system.

    He can’t write a sentence.

    He cannot THINK.

  23. Avatar
    Anonymous

    Bowman focuses on vocabulary (I should have written “incredible”) and ignores the intended message.

    By the way we are all anonymous here.

  24. Veritas Avatar
    Veritas

    Wuold nonsense written by American rednecks stop me from visiting Canada? Did Enoch Powell affect UK immigration? Come on, Barbados is a democracy. Weirdos and all…

  25. Avatar
    Anonymous

    Not too long ago I read on the computer that a Chinese man traveling on a long distance bus to Toronto from the country side of Canada decapitated a white man passenger on board the bus. It was a very gruesome crime to say the least, and I am sure that incident did not stop the people from using the Canadian bus system.

    Had I not come to this website I would not have heard of the Canadian lady tourist. Young girls travelling though are kidnapped and taken into bondage as sex slaves for Arab men, but that does not stop the young girls from visiting Europe.

    I also find it very strange that when ever black people state how they feel about other people it is construed as racism, but when a white person, and especially and old white persons say the same thing I hear oh they are from the old school. Negroman is Afrocentric, nothing wrong with that, don’t forget now the way we we got to the Caribbean. We have to remember how we got here, and if we forget then somebody else will come and do the same to us again.

  26. Avatar
    Anonymous

    I am annoymous here as I am Guyanese and I just don’t want any problems. I had a bitter experience already when I tried to tell you about the East Indians and then I got to thinking my family could be killed in Guyana by the racist, inept, corrupt Guyanese Government, so I had to reverse myself. I don’t want trouble. I do my work and mind my own business.

  27. peltdownman Avatar
    peltdownman

    Can we please go back to the original purpose of this thread?
    David, the “Totally Barbados” definition does not describe our tourism product, it merely describes a framework within which a product has to be created and sold. Please, continue to bury your head in the sand whilst our potential visitors go somewhere else.

  28. David Avatar
    David

    @peltdownman

    BU is trying to play devil’s advocate here!

    Agree with you that our tourism product needs a refocus.

  29. Bonny Peppa Avatar
    Bonny Peppa

    J
    This onslaught on Negroman is uncalled for. He spoke his mind and ruffled a few feathers, so to speak, and you and Bowman especially seem to want to lynch him. You serious? He only spoke what others were maybe thinking. If he is racist, you know what? It takes all types to make this world turn. His comments will have no negative effect on tourism and if you think so then you’re only fooling yourself.
    Gimme a break, please.

    As for BU censoring every submission, more hogwash. You are making a mountain out of a mole heap.

    We are a loving, caring people and one unfortunate incident cannot tarnish our good reputation as a tourist destination. They will still come if they so desire.
    So please stop burying your head in the sand.

  30. peltdownman Avatar
    peltdownman

    Our tourism product needs a re-focus. Yes, but it’s much more fun calling visitors “white trash”, whilst taking their money. Oh, I forgot. They owe it to us.

  31. Adrian Loveridge Avatar
    Adrian Loveridge

    Peltdownan,

    I agree with a lot of your observations.

    We clearly havn’t defined our product and even if we try, there still isn’t a level playing field.
    As a small hotel we have each year to go through the hoops and hurdles to obtain our BTA licence. It takes something like 11 clearance certificates.
    And its as if the various departments play a game so that once you think you have collected everything then one is out of date, so start all over again.
    Yet all around us there are properties operating as hotels, apartments and guest hotels without ANY licence at all.

    Some of them even appear on the NATIONAL tourism website and others receive massive amounts of taxpayers Dollars in marketing support.

    We HAVE to become more professional
    in what we do.

  32. Fair Play Avatar
    Fair Play

    Tourism which allows more Barbadians to come into contact with the tourists may be the way to go. It is our people who tourists feel comfortable mixing with.
    The south coast should be the place where this concept should be fully capitalized on.
    Oistins is a classic example. I visit there and see the happiness on those visitors faces as they enjoy themselves in a safe environment.
    The Government must ensure the place remains safe with more police presence from Bay Street to Oistins.
    The Government should also take over the Graeme Hall site and make it in to a National Park. Any underhand deals with lands surrounding the park would be exposed eventually and any politicians involved with this ignorance will feel the wrath of the people.
    The beaches should be kept in pristine conditions with well kept changing rooms at each major beach.
    Controlled Street vending should be allowed at strategic points in and around Bridgetown when cruise ships are in port.

  33. STINGING NETTLE Avatar
    STINGING NETTLE

    What everybody needs to know is, there is something called ‘competition’ in the world, and there are destinations, and new ones coming “on stream” every day, that are offering much more. Better rates, better service, better entertainment, more interesting things to do…. and if we are to compete it requires full participation by every citizen, and not just a few ‘advertisments’ here and there or ‘sales promotion’ gimmicks…

  34. David Avatar
    David

    When all is said and done people want to feel safe. It is not only about increasing a police presence but ordinary Bajans understanding the role we have to play to make Barbados safe in the minds of the tourists. The administrative stuff Adrian mentioned can be fixed easily with the right leadership.

    Competition will always be with us it should spur us on, we have a head start! Even if we create a product mix it will be copied in a minute because Barbados has no significant natural or other marks.

  35. Ready Done Avatar
    Ready Done

    “Tourism which allows more Barbadians to come into contact with the tourists may be the way to go.”

    I like were your going with this fair play & i second all your reconmedations whole heartedly.

    South coast is the best place for this type of tourism while the west should be allowed to continue how it is……..

    Lets not forget the world is “going green” and we need to capitalize on this.
    The world wants healthy lifestyles and we have the ability to give it to them.

    @ Negroman you ever spend time any where besides Barbados?

  36. Ready Done Avatar
    Ready Done

    Your comment is awaiting moderation?

    What up with that?

    Free press ent so free no more. tsk tsk.

    I think BU should set up the blog in such a way that the members can vote for each post so we ALL can see what are the popular opinions

    DAVID!

  37. David Avatar
    David

    @Ready Done

    Your comments are being directed to moderation, we don’t know why. Just relax and we will remove.

    We can turn on the vote for comments feature. Some people like it some don’t.

  38. Ready Done Avatar
    Ready Done

    I got the same problem in real life, my mouth too big, bout the wrong things, lol. However if every one can vote/moderate each other i think everyone reading the blog can get a good indication as to how the average bajan feels about the said topic discussed.

    Who afraid of getting rate most likely talking $#!+.

  39. Mongoose Avatar
    Mongoose

    Open Letter to David, Host of BU: I got just one question fuh you skipper. Have you revisited the WordPress.com website recently. Perhaps you should go there and review your contractual agreement with them. Stop with that phony “Devil’s Advocate” bullshit. You are clearly in violation of your agreement and Terms of Service with WordPress.com. You have allowed this blog to become a forum for hate mongering and racist diarrhea. Do you have any balls at all or are you a eunuch?
    Perhaps the truth is that you, in fact, advocate and wish to promote a racist agenda while remaining in the background under the guise of “free speech”. Get ready David because after all the letters reach the administrators of WordPress.com, you days will be numbered.

  40. Themis Avatar
    Themis

    @Mongoose/Jack Bowman

    I have taken the time to read through the Terms of Service at WordPress.com and in my opinion BU is not in breach of any of its terms. You would dearly wish for that, wouldn’t you?

  41. Bonny Peppa Avatar
    Bonny Peppa

    Mongoose,
    Ya idiot.

  42. Pearl Avatar
    Pearl

    Bds is an established market. A few years ago very few had heard of it let alone visited. Nowadays most people know of it or have visited or heard about Bds in a film or so on. So we have our work cut out.

    I agree with some of the comments in that we need to try and keep our country clean. In places like the UK the streets are sometimes so dirty you have to walk with your head down, for fear of stepping in something. We really need to appreciate what we have and upkeep it.

    It annoys me when you’re driving through Holetown, I believe near Lime Grove and you see horse dung on the pavement. For days sometimes! What message is that sending our guests? Admittedly if I was a sanitation worker I wouldn’t want to clean it up either. The owners should be made to do it and fined!

    In terms of attracting new tourists,I think the idea of tourists having more contact with Bajans is a great idea.

    Many tourists seem to love the mini buses or ‘reggae buses’ as I’ve heard them refer to. The tourists like to eat by the roadside from the vendors. I sometimes wonder if we have become to ‘westernised’ and lost some of the ‘Bajaness’ (I know that’s not a word). Have we become arrogant and now give the tourist what we think they want and not what they actually want?

    Take Pelican Village. It was so much more appealing when it was made up of wooden chattel houses. (Chattel houses as a whole seem to be disappearing). Nowadays itjust looks cold uninviting. Let’s face it you can go anywhere in the US or UK and find a concrete structure with AC.

    Even our beaches too controlled. Take Mullins for instance, covered with blue beach umbrellas and chairs. Yes they’re convenient but seeing a beach like that, just takes something away.

    On a smaller scale maybe we need to promote some of the traditional food. I remember years ago when you could go into Woolworths and buy a ham cutter. How easy is it to get a ham cutter (Farmers Choice) in town now, not a designer sub. Lets boost up our snow cone vendors as well.

    We’ve diversified in terms of tourism i.e. sports tourism, conferences etc. I’m not sure where we can go now but it has to be something out of the box to attract new visitors.

    Perhaps we could do like the French (we may already do it?) and encourage tourist as part of their vacation package to learn how to cook the Bajan way. It may even attract some Bajans who live abroad and have forgotten or never learnt how to cook cou cou or sugar cakes or so on…..a niche market but every thing helps. Perhaps it could be tagged onto a Taste of Barbados i.e taste it and cook it.

    I think we need to sit down and list what makes Barbados special and then work from there. What can we offer that is different to everyone else and then who it will appeal to.

    Anyway that aside was the BTA not going to target the Brazilian market? Whatever happened with that? How about trying to attract the Japanese again so that when their economy improves they know where to vacation?

  43. alfonzo Avatar
    alfonzo

    @Pearl

    I disagree with the fact that everyone knows Barbados. I think that is the main problem why the US market is still trailing and suffering.

    Any ways I think that those old traditional things like snow cones and coconuts, chattel houses and so much more is what these people are leaving there homes for to come and experience. They go to Jamaica, Bahamas, Bermuda etc because they know what they offer. Barbados has fallen into the trap by using predominately white people in our ads. People are why tourist come to barbados…we are some of the most courteous and friendly people in the world. Hope the boys at the BTA read this blog.

  44. livinginbarbados Avatar
    livinginbarbados

    For tourism to work, it has to have a distinct advantage over similar offerings. It is not enough to offer say, sand, sea, sun, sex, safety. These are on offer all over the world. So, it has to be at what price and is it better or more plentiful than elsewhere, including at home?

    Tourism is still a luxury for many people, so as they have to tighten expenses, there is more pressure on looking for value for money. Why fly 12 hours from England when you could travel half the time to get the same, and for less? Why choose Barbados over The Bahamas, or Jamaica, or Dominican Republic or Cuba or Bermuda? Having loveable people is not enough. I have been with visitors at the Hilton and been astonished how they are discouraged by staff from taking advantage of what the hotel is offering! I spoke to some managers about that, and it seems to have been dealt with at least when I am with visitors. But this is a flagship hotel.

    I have also put forward before the idea that the exit from the current recession will leave Barbados with a shrunken tourism sector that will not grow again just because the world in growing again. Some small hotels and restaurants, for example, have died and will not be reborn or replace. The bigger hotels may have margins to absorb this downturn but do so at the expense of hotels who cannot. It’s dog eat dog.

  45. livinginbarbados Avatar
    livinginbarbados

    Adrian, I offered the comments below on BFP, but in case you did not see them, I repeat.

    Adrian, though not an expert, you may be able to shed light. I’m an economist. I wonder how it’s possible for the restaurants concerned to live with the heavy discounting during the re-discover period, which is very long. Are they really profitable or at least breaking even, or are they taking losses and if so, with what future pay off?

    My general view is that restaurants here are over priced, and my personal decision for about 18 months was to boycott most of them (see http://livinginbarbados.blogspot.com/2007/11/boycotting-restaurants.html), except when special deals were on (rare) or if someone treated me (as rare). I prefer to find good, reasonably priced, fare, especially if it’s local/regional food (love Jus Grilling, Ackee Tree, Muster’s, Kingston 10, Shakers, many ‘hole in the wall’ restaurants that offer great food without the need for a bailout plan). Or, more often, I eat food cooked at home.

    That, to me, is a big indictment of a key pillar of the local hospitality industry. But, I do not have a fix. I know that UK tourists, with an overvalued currency, especially when the pound was around US$2, and even now at US$1.65/1.70, can support these prices. For Americans, there was no such advantage, with the 2:1 peg between the B$ and US$.

    In fact, I have found that it works out cheaper to do that and occasionally fly to NYC and have a week of fine dining there. The logic of that is that Americans are unlikely to find a holiday to Bim that involves paying for dining a good deal.

  46. Adrian Loveridge Avatar
    Adrian Loveridge

    LivinginBarbados,

    How does a trying to be hotelier explain the logics to an economist.

    The re-DISCOVER offer may not be very profitable to many of the restaurants participating but it is supplying a base line.

    Like airlines and hotels you need to fill a percentage number of seats or beds to cover the basic operational costs.

    Revenue control.

    Plus there is the possibility that those patrons enticed by the $99 offer will return sometime in the future at normal prices.
    So its an investment, while at the same time protecting jobs.

    Those restaurants will still need good staff when the global economic situation recovers.
    Better to take a smaller profit margin and hang on to them.

    You have made some very good observations, and I hope that if you are an economist for one of the big banks they are listening to you.

  47. livinginbarbados Avatar
    livinginbarbados

    @Adrian Loveridge, I can understand the logic of what you say, though the length of the offer (to mid-December) seems to push the limits (though, I realise you cannot easily go on/off with the business).

    No banks to advise in my life. I’m a former IMF staffer, now taking time to reflect on things Bajan, in a manner of speaking, and happily trying to make sense of things around me.

    Thanks.

  48. Richard Williams and company Avatar
    Richard Williams and company

    One thing that is clear to see is that this BTA, the Minister and the President and Board are not taking any nonsense from people entrusted with the well being of the taxpayers monies.

    The recent firings of a few is the direct result of the discovery of blatant abuse of Credit Cards dating back to to in excess of 12 years in this office, this recent discovery as was brought to light by the ever vilgilant President of the BTA Mr Rice, he was fully supported by his minister and his board and the decision was to terminate the relationship with Mr Williams among others with great haste.

    This is a Government elected on the promise of full accountability and to do anything other than fire those that were known to have played a part to allow this fraud to take place, it would have failed its people.

    It is enough to say that since this discovery of the abuse of the credit cards the current use of BTA issued Credit Cards has dropped by as much as $ 70,000.00 in one month, this is something that ones such as minister Lynch would have witnessed or observered during his time as minister but choose not to act because he too played the same game.

    The abuse ran far and wide, major abuse of Limo services, work awarded with no purchase orders, one company providing from cleaning services to providing computers and advertising services but it is a warning to all that honesty must prevail at any cost.

  49. David Avatar
    David

    It is noble the BTA if true has beefed up internal expense controls but the real kudos will be in the creating of innovative marketing programs and product which can sustain our tourist numbers.

  50. Ready Done Avatar
    Ready Done

    Not to derail the tread but one thing that was clearly bajan that would have been nice to offer the tourist was when the zrs were painted fancy. I heard visitors talk about them more than once .

    That is one uniquely bajan thing that had potential but wasn’t exploited.

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