Barbadians were told to expect a 10% increase in their electricity bills from as early as next month. As expected the news has triggered consternation in a population made lazy by a subsidy to buffer fuel increases – since removed by the current government – and behaviour fuelled by a ravenous consumption lifestyle. There was a time when Chief Marketing Officer Stephen Worme made himself available to BU to answer questions about BL&P’s role in a national energy policy among other issues, until the BU intelligentsia exposed his utterances as public relations spiel.

It was about three years ago Barbadians were having the same conversation sparked when the price of a barrel of oil rose to $147.00 When will we learn? Barbados is a country which is totally reliant on fossil fuel to general energy. Successive governments in the last 20 years have refused to wean the Barbados economy from the model which is driving us down a path of economic disaster. BU finds it amusing that the former Prime Minister Owen Arthur was quoted in the media today speaking to the issue of the rising fuel charge and his astute solution is to reduce the excise tax. One would have thought when his government managed the economy in the boom years the strategic approach should have been to create a framework to mitigate Barbados’ reliance on fossil fuel. Perhaps this was too much to ask because it is the stuff of which LEADERSHIP is measured!

The folly of our predicament is now compounded by a current state where debt to GDP has climbed over 100% driven by government’s policy to use domestic debt as a strategy to protect the social and economic fabric of the society. The current government finds itself incurring domestic debt at an alarming rate to pay day to day bills including public sector salaries. The irony is most of government debt of late is not about capacity building. The conclusion is that with a volatile situation in the Middle East the price of a barrel of oil will not dip in the foreseeable future. The BU family has already highlighted the reality for the oil business which has seen the cost to drill oil increased significantly from where it was in the 70s, the moral of the story, oil production will remain high now and for evermore.

Until Barbadians remove the political lens through which they filter information they will continue to accept bullshit from the political directorate and the power brokers they serve. The fact that Barbados is satisfied to have achieved a level of success if we use measurements designed by the developed world, the question forward thinking Barbadians should have asked and answered a long time ago – is our economic model relevant to ensure the best output for BARBADOS? The obvious answer is no given that our economic model relies exclusively on oil. In times of plenty we supported an inefficient public sector, we earmarked a dump in the Scotland District and the list of useless multi-million dollar projects is endless. This is not about showing political colours, more about making the best decisions which place Barbados’ strategic interest at the centre.

This weekend we had the embarrassing situation on radio where a few of our lawyers expressed exasperation at the ineffectiveness of  our administration of justice. These are the same lawyers who all applauded the legacy of retired Chief Justice David Simmons a few months ago. We have those who consider former Prime Minister Owen Arthur an economic guru yet Barbados finds itself in a position where true leadership during his reign would have seen a Barbados building out an alternative energy plant.

Come on Barbadians! If we are to demonstrate we have been able recipients of the free education our forefathers laid the brickwork for us to benefit, have we delivered value to satisfy their expectation? From their graves the answer is a resounding no!

Former Prime Minister Owen Arthur also reminded Barbadians this weekend that Barbados prided itself not too long ago of being a model in several spheres of enterprise for the world to view. For some of our achievements we can be justly proud, regrettably on the issue of tweaking the economic model to encourage and sustain the best quality of life Barbadian style, we have failed. So who are we to blame but we ourselves.