Minister David Estwick responded to the privatization debate of the Barbados Labour Party (BLP) on the weekend. There are many who believe he should be at the helm of the finance ministry. His blustery delivery on the weekend adds another view to that of Peter Wickham the pollster.
Pollster Peter Wickham Pushing The Barbados Labour Party Privatization Agenda
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Is Peter Wickham, or any other citizen not entitled to a view on matters of national interest? Just checking. By the way, I have collected quotations from several speakers from within the DLP, the BLP, other Barbadian agents and agencies, external institutions, and it would appear that both political parties in Barbados, in fact, do support privatisation. Why is the DLP showing cowardice and deceit on the matter? Why would the Minister of Finance, the Prime Minister, and other Ministers attempt to back away when they have on separate occasions, aided and abetted by the Governor of the Central Bank articulated, perhaps in nuanced language, the same exact need for private sector led groth, making cuts and trimming costs regarding the size and performce of the government? Would the DLP truly risk harm to the national economy for the sake of winning an election? I guess I will share some of the quotes from pivotal speeches made by DLP members so that Barbadians can see that the DLP is far away and possibly lost from revealing the truth.
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@George Brathwaite
Peter Wickham is the foremost political pollster in this part of the world.
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So political pollsters cannot do other jobs? The man has been writing and speaking on issues for many years. The man is arguably one of the best moderators in Barbados. On what grounds should he be seriously kept away from public discourse?
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@enuff
The evidence is there that Bajans do not have an appetite for investing. A privatization strategy will mean in the current state foreigners will take up the offerings.
Why sell is the only option? Are we not able to make efficient? Part of the problem with these state agencies is the level of political interference/croynism. Are we to understand because of inept politicians we have to agree to dumping state assets to a lazy private sector or outsiders with deep pockets?
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@George
The man is an opinion shaper which conflicts of interest in his role as a pollster. You need to remove your political lens.
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Owen Athur’s lies are becoming clearer day by day. People were waiting for this grand economic magic solution proposal from Arthur – how disappointed they were.
The 15 point point plan was exposed as a fraud by Professor Michael Howard, The Barbados Economic Society had to admit that Arthur was just throwing out promises and would create a financial mess, it was clinically destroyed by David Estwick last night.
It is obvious now that the BLP can criticise and spend a lot of money in ads but they have not put one workable economic proposal on the table.
Arthur has nothing new or visionary to offer politics in Barbados.
He should do himself and his party a favour and bow out gracefully.Imagine a man who was Prime Minister for 14 years and could not make not one of these statutory corporations profitable can come and look into a camera and tell people with a straight face that we need to make them profitable to make them attractive to investors.
If this was so easy, why did he not do it before. After all, he had more time than anyone else.Think on that.
Barbados it is obvious – Arthur has nothing new to offer and those who live in the nostalgic world of the growing world economy of the late 1990s need to face the real world of 2012.
Owen “Mitt Romney” Arthur has not put one specific practical solution on the table. We do not want back Owen “Mitt Romney” Arthur. -
One of the most telling statements made at the recent BLP town Hall was made by David Simpson the head of ICAB. He said many of the state agencies have not had their financials updated since 2006/2007. If we are serious we have to efficiently manage. Why can’t we as an intelligent people have extracted financials produced on time?
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David, I fundamentally disagree with you. Peter and I have had several differences of opinion. Peter has clashed with persons in the BLP including being critical of the party leader. Why for years it was never a problem but turns up as a problem today? Sorry, the man has every right like anybody else to choose what issues or persons or party to support. That is a constitutional right last time I checked in Barbados. Equally, I support you doing your thing. I may not agree with you on several issues inclusive of this, but I believe it is your right!
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@George
We can agree to disagree.
As BAFBFP stated, why is he not so vocal about FOI and Integrity legislation? Even campaign financing?
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Dr. David Estwick – September 6, 2010: “At the national level, there must be collaboration between the private sector and the technology community in both the public sector and academia to address problems of national importance. To encourage and foster this kind of demand-driven collaboration, it is essential that the private sector feels confident in our science and technology community. Only through private-public-sector-and-academia collaborations can we really begin to address problems that are mutually beneficial and that enhance economic, human and sustainable development.”
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Christopher Sinckler – March 21, 2011: “It is almost certain that costs of economic decline in an economy as open and fragile as ours will always have to be borne in both weakness in the public fiscal accounts and heavy job losses particularly in the private sector.”
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The best proposal so far has come from Donville Inniss and the DLP. When Donville Inniss was being honest about looking to root out inefficiencies in the Barbados Drug Service and our health care system, the same BLP went around Barbados criticising the man left , right and centre saying how he was looking to unfair the people and a lot of hogwash.
The reforms of the drug service were delayed by the BLP for political reasons while the burden to the state was growing astronomically.
Now Owen “Mitt Romney” Arthur is promoting a level of paro politics to say we must sell everything. – JOKER – Why Arthur does not mortgage his house and ask the Transport Board or the SSA to let him buy some shares and pay back the bank every month?Who Owen “Mitt Romney” Arthur think that he fooling? Arthur is obviously bankrupt when it comes to any new ideas.
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Delisle Worrell – March 17, 2011: “Nothing will insure you against the kind of recession we have experienced since 2008 and continue to experience, which affects all the countries to which we sell goods and services. However, the odds are that the incidence of such wide-ranging disaster will be infrequent. In order to build resilience in less taxing circumstances, diversification continues to be a fundamental aspect of Barbados’ growth strategy.”
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David Thompson – 2009 Budgetary Proposals. “We have to remove subsidies to operations which are commercial or supposed to break even. Government itself will have to be leaner and more efficient. We will also have to maintain capital spending in the economy in order to lay the infrastructural foundations for the country to produce more in the future.”
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DLP 2008 Manifesto – “The new DLP Government will therefore put in place the legislation, institutional structures and resources to increase the number of self-employed entrepreneurs from about 10% of the working population to 20% by 2016.”
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That is my 30 point plan – Let every BLP candidate commit to borrowing money from a bank or credit union and putting some equity in these statutory corporations .
Arthur as opposition leader should make the biggest investment. After all , if the BLP telling people to put money in these bodies, they should lead by example.
I am willing to bet that not one of them will do it. This is bare BLP lies and gimmicks.
Bajans are rejecting Owen “Mitt Romney” Arthur’s brand of Paro politics.We do not want bak Arthur- He has nothing new or exciting to offer.
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Freundel Start 1996 Budget: “On the issue of investment, persons who are intended to invest must have money … because politics for me requires bringing them into the mainstream of the Barbadian economy…. So my plea is for the investment by Government in the creation of a new private sector, not a private sector that necessarily destroys the existing private sector, because as far as I am concerned they are entitled to exist.”
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Lloyd Erskine Sandiford – 1993 Budgetary Statement: “If Barbados, however, is to emerge from the current recessionary conditions in good shape, and if our country is to maintain, nay, improve its current status as one of the leading developing countries, then there are certain fundamentals which we must all agree upon and to which we must all commit ourselves. First of all, we must recommit ourselves to a mixed economy in which the Government plays the leading role and in which the private sector also plays a key role with market forces largely determining prices and quantities, productivity and distribution. This must be preferred to the command economy in which the production of goods and services is chiefly determined by the directives of Government.”
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@George
What is the point of the cut and paste and does it respond to the debate about selling our prized state assets. The issue is not about the importance of private sector. It is what kind of country do we want. Which state agencies should be dumped etc.
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Now pray tell me, what is the DLP’s position? What have they articulated and practiced over the years? The DEMS are playing with the minds of Barbadians rather than manage the economy. They should go en masse!
I will not post anything else for now, but I have many more instances indicating implicitly or explicitly the DEMS position on privatisation, divestment, scaling back the public service, selling shares to the workers, you name it. They just do not have the balls to govern effectively! -
You cannot stimulate demand in an open economy where the majority of your demand is for imported goods unless you have the foreign capital inflows. That is not rocket science – that is the fast track to the IMF and a balance of payments crisis.
Owen Arthur is either lying or being very irresponsible in what he is proposing in an environment where tourism and international business is sluggish due to slow growth in source markets.
Professor Michael Howard and the Barbados Economic Society suggest he is being irresponsible.In other words, Arthur is proposing things that cannt be done without creating a financial mess.They are generous. I beleive that Owen ” Mitt Romney” Arthur is lying intentionally.
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@David
This final one is by DT. It precisely answers your question and supports the model identified by the BLP. And you are telling me that the DEMS are not being deceptive? -
We do not want back Owen Arthur | November 12, 2012 at 11:47 PM |
That is my 30 point plan – Let every BLP candidate commit to borrowing money from a bank or credit union and putting some equity in these statutory corporations .My friend the BLP politicians that I know like Barney Lynch who had a loan taken out while he was Minister of Government when he borrowed the tidy sum of $ 75,000.00 from The Royal Bank and never made a single attempt to repay any part of the loan and it was the now Ambassador to Washington who opted to avoid embarrassment to a sitting Minister of Government and the debt of the $ 75,000.00 was eventually written off so as not to embarrass the BLP government and the then Minister of Tourism, this was prior to making his windfall of funds out of his deal with Carnival Cruise Lines that the taxpayers funded to the tune of in excess of $ 50 Million and out of which he bought his Gregg Farm Plantation House that he shares with part time wife and Rasta Boy Friend Cum Driver.
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@It is me the Giver of truth
Noel Lynch should never see the steps of Parliament again and these corrupt BLP politicians are looking to come back to pick up where they left off like pigs running to the trough.
It is clear that the BLP is bankrupt of any new ideas or approaches. -
@George
What should fuel enfranchising Bajans is not the need to create cashflow for government. What is the philosophy? What are strategic assets?
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When Clyde Mascoll who is best known for cursing the BLP and wasting taxpayers money in Hardwood Housing scam can get the Grantley Adams award and those poor BLP supporters in St. Thomas, Christ Church West and St. Joseph who day in day out cussing people for the BLP cannot get a road even when the BLP in power, you know that the BLP leadership does not give a damn about even some of their own supporters.
Time to send Arthur a message- We do not want back Owen “Mitt Romney” Arthur. -
Braithwaite is a clown and a relic of the past, his politics resides in an Grantley Adams era not of 2012 and going forward.
If at his late stage of life and he is still in school trying to earn a degree I hardly think that he has much by way of sense to offer to Barbadians on the subject of if Barbadians should be forced to pay for the health and hospital care or if they should be made to pay for their school books their school fees their education their buss rides to and from school or their buss rides in total, he has no understanding of these things, Arthur benefited from the privilege of a free education all the way thru to UWI Mona and what a shameful act that he would want to kick down the ladder and prevent our children from climbing the ladder to their hope and to their own betterment and their own bright future!
He is pathetic and a sad excuse for a leader, corrupt and corrupt of morals.
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Coming out of the BLP town hall Peter Wickham shared feedback of Cadres Poll i.e. Bajans are not thrilled about privatization. The BLP will have to be precise in its communication strategy on this matter. It probable explains the town halls and co-opting Wickham’s involvement.
Let us see what RED creates for the BLP.
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We also need to hear a lot more about Mascoll’s posit that a significant % of spend circulates in the domestic economy. This is a message if communicated correctly can give wings to the BLP’s position that more money in the pockets of Bajans is the answer. BU has to admit we have our doubt and Estwick confirms in the video above when he referred to early stimulus by the DLP which negatively affected our international cover.
The botomline, we need to create forex generating capacity.
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Is this what you want for Barbados or for Barbadians ?
Owen Arthur desperately distances himself from arrangements for the new prison – Aug 2011
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During the 2011 Budget debate Owen Arthur tried to distance himself from the stench surrounding the arrangements for the new prison built under his reign. Prime Minister Freundel Stuart and Finance Minister Christopher Sinckler however managed to straddle him and nail him down to the scene of the breach for future scrutiny.
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The two parties have latched onto this privatization thing as a means of separating them on an issue before the next election. Again it is a non-issue. Either one will sell you up the creek if pressed hard enough by a monied international concern. It is important to try and steer the debate back to where it was, to try and have the public refocus on the issues that were important before this privatization foolishness started, on the issues that they have both gone silent on …!
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I am truly sorry fellow DLP traffickers,time to speak out. We really and truly have nothing to show for the 4 12 yrs we wasted pushing this country back 10 years. Really now we must ‘give jack his jacket’ and step up to the plate. We were just unable to match up to our promises and was given a leader that just never matched up to our last. It was from here on the problems started. Lets face it….We blundered up everything. We even had an attempted mutiny but was quelled by the Opposition not backing an informal no confidence motion that would have freed us. Tough luck. Somebody did not do their homework and the Eager11 was made to look like Eager ‘juck’ asses.
Now I am ALL for’ love of country’ a true EWB party man,I want this country to GO FORWARD, if we cannot do it, then we must concede gracefully and stop all this rhetoric I am seeing on this blog. We have no assets to show as was rightly put forward and yet we mouthing off. Stupidity and desperation, but can I afford to cast my vote blindly to PM Stuart and the rest of you bankrupt of ideas lot?NO I think not, nor cannot any right think true Barbadian.
All I am hearing is attacking of persons and not debating of issues. DLP supporters on this blog, you are more doing the party an injustice and showing us up more. We have nothing to fall back on for the four years we been here.DO WE? So if we have to go the way of privatization and sell off a few houses til we get back on our feet, so be it. Better than doing nothing and character assassinations don’t you think? Its time we moved on.
Can we afford to be sinking $4 Million in loses in the Transport Board each month? No so we must do something…It cannot go on…stupidity something must be done. Come on let’s rise the level of debate and stop the pointing of fingers. It sounds rather silly coming from educated Barbadians.True supporter, possible non voter this time
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@BAFBFP
We have Wickham on the radio twice a week, and on Sundays pushing this agenda. We have Jevan and RED pushing the strategy of privatization in social media etc. We have the BLPites trolling. It is up to to David Ellis, Stedson Babb and others to realize what is happening.
@all
Starting from today all those using multiple monikers will be deleted.
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Peter Wickham need to go and sit on a POLE !
He is a scoundrel.
I would never forget how he tried to destroy the BLP and Owen Arthur last general election.
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@ Drunk Arthur
“Braithwaite is a clown and a relic of the past, his politics resides in an Grantley Adams era not of 2012 and going forward.If at his late stage of life and he is still in school trying to earn a degree I hardly think that he has much by way of sense to offer to Barbadians …”
Thanks for the insight. Maybe it is precisely why I do what I do. You seem green. No problems with you short-changing yourself, but consider what you are suggesting to young people, and the old clowns like me who in general happen to be living longer and making contributions to national life for longer periods. It is sad that when you cannot beat the message you revert to writing the crap you wrote but know little or nothing about me. Silly person, don’t you think?
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Fuel prices high, water n light a pickpocket,
Cell and telephone rip rip rip.
Nothing to smile about,
Rest assured, a price gouging trip
Leaving one with barely anything,
Empty pockets, and ready to quit.What once seemed an obviously easy fix,
Somehow turned into a maze.
Headmaster versus teachers,
Commissions to solve,
Stupidity at its highest….
Bare blusterous calls.Elections time now, and we see all kinda frauds
DEM like African snails all bout
With criticizing calls
Georgie education, got sum pipped
Cannot make D grade,you see
So they about to flip..Education is still free bout hay
So why chomp ur bit
Unless you a siilly billy
With saw dust n chipsTo the peeved:
Again I say…get sum goats heads and fish heads you asshead
Take that dunce ! -
PETR Wickham has no credibilty but like they say birds of a feather flock together OSA and Peter Wickham one of the same TWO PHONIES!
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OFF TOPIC
“The Caribbean News Now blogging community has sadly lost a stalwart contributor to this online news site, in the recent (November 3rd) sad passing of the inimitable Wade “Kojo” Williams (63), renowned Vincentian socio-political activist in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. He had lately taken ill.
Mr Wade Williams was a former police officer, politician and journalist in SVG, and a security professional in Canada. He regularly coordinated black history and SVG diasporic events in his adopted homeland in North America.
Mr Williams was also a former secretary general of the Robert Milton Cato-led St Vincent Labour Party (SVLP), senator, and deputy speaker of the SVG Parliament”
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If the DLP would spend half the time it does on attacking people…on finding solutions to the MESS they unleash on we the people during the WORST FIVE YEAR TERM in Barbados history…maybe just maybe….people would take you all serious……you all are just PATHETIC…..DID ABSOLUTELY NOTHING….and bout hay with BIG MOUTHS….HUSH DO.!! YOU ALL WILL LOSE THIS ELECTIONS COMPREHENSIVELY…..RING THE BELL , RING THE BELL DO….put an end to this comedy.
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David wrote that starting today those using multiple monikers will be deleted.Long time coming.Oh yes there is a God.
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@ Aarson
Like David take away your WHIP ?…..whalosss Mr. Romney Arthur…or was it ….a cannot even remember….a brekkin up ..lol -
Just saying.
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“David wrote that starting today those using multiple monikers will be deleted.Long time coming.Oh yes there is a God.”
God David?
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@ David
Owen ‘Mitt Romney’ Arthur | November 13, 2012 at 8:03 AM |Just saying.
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Wait …he musse Aarson twin brudda……then….the ignorance was uncanny -
Roose Dem David …Roose Dem…imposters….DEM want 3 bites at the cherry….uncover the bandits and touts….ac in trouble too…lol
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David expose them to us that will fix dem especially Onions!
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…chips n saw dust…..expose DEM all…..
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@islandgal & Hamilton
We give latitude to a few commenters who for good reasons may want to post a comment using another moniker but always we have a few and we stress a few who take a mile when given an inch. If those multi monikers continue we will heed islandgal’s advice and name them. After several years at this we are quite familiar with all the tricks ie proxies, cellphone etc.
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@David
Starting from today all those using multiple monikers will be deleted. Starting from today all those using multiple monikers will be deleted.
*******************Wuhloss! Onions just hired a Crisis Manager.
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