The climate developing countries have to manage affairs of state appears to be very challenging at this time. Barbados the former colony can no longer expect to hide or be protected by England. There was a time we benefited from preferential trade treatment which seemed fair in a dog eat dog world where the ‘strongest’ always has the best chance to navigate challenges.
In a post 54th independence period sensible Barbadians are forced to reflect and to ask – where do we go from here?
Some debate whether the decline of the Barbados economy (and society) started in the 70s, what is for certain is that the decline accelerated after the 2008 global recession. The structure of our economy with an over reliance on services made us extremely vulnerable to significant slowdown in the world economy. Unfortunately we have been unable to patch the vulnerability which has been exposed again by the Covid 19 pandemic.
Reading many comments on BU and listening to commentary elsewhere, it has become painfully obvious despite the dark challenges facing Barbados there are unrealistic expectations the leadership of the country has not address. Barbadians for many years have enjoyed a reasonable standard of living supported by deficit financing in the post Barrow period. There is nothing wrong with spending more than you earn but it is a practice which cannot be sustained. Successive governments in the last four decades have borrowed heavily to pursue national budget objects. We can continue to quibble about who to blame and see where that get us.
The blogmaster is palpably aware from walking among Barbadians on a daily basis that many are suffering from a form of ‘Alice in Wonderland Syndrome’. At a household level commonsense would dictate that supporting a lifestyle of spending more than one earns will lead eventually to a problem. Why do Barbadians expect a different outcome if successive governments continue to engage in reckless financial management? We have spent billions on education, should citizens possess the awareness to translate it to a strident lobby against the establishment to ensure realistic policy decisions are implemented? What about other key stakeholders in civil society like media houses/practitioners and NGO groups?
In the 54 Not Out blog there is a cursory discussion about local media. We have a David Ellis who has been the standout media person in Barbados over the years but a single journalist will not do it. Also we do not have the columnists of the past who provoked deep thought in the population the likes of Oliver Jackman, Gladstone Holder, Leonard Shorey to name only three. Active NGO groups are important as well because interest can be more forcefully represented in numbers. We are at a place in Barbados all problems must be solved by the government. To move forward we must implement a fit for purpose governance model. The reactionary approach to managing our affairs will not deliver meaningful long term results. We fail to plan, we plan to fail.
This morning as the blogmaster sips from a cup of peppermint tea alone with his thoughts, it is clear the country is suffering from a ‘fatigue’, especially wrought by the post 2008 period. This was compounded by a severe policy prescription that has decimated the hopes and dreams of the middleclass forced to witness a manhandling of nest eggs in the most unprecedented way. Finally came Covid 19.
The unprecedented times in which we live demands a degree of planning and collaboration between stakeholders in civil society never envisaged. The blogmaster is unable to reconcile conversations emanating from the mouths of key actors given what the national imperatives should be. Propping up a lifestyle fuelled by conspicuous consumption must be addressed. Calibrating our educations system to produce citizens who can compete to support themselves. Dismantling sub cultures and replace with initiatives to nurture national pride. The forgoing should positively impact crime. Last but not least the environment. We have to care about the space in which we have to exist.
No more tea…
Discuss for 15 marks.
And according the Barbados parliament website, there hasn’t been an official gazette since January 2020. Not even an extra ordinary one as implemented for a while in 2019. They published 12 in Jan 2020 alone, and then…..
https://www.barbadosparliament.com/gazette
@Artax
here, I believe, is the relevant quote from the article posted by @David above
“Caddle said that agreement needed to be reached where it was understood that integrity legislation was not just for Government, but extended to the private sector where they too would be subjected to the same sanctions as public officials.”(quote)
You already know that is tantamount to an extra 50 pages and a 2 year delay. Sounds sweet, but……
@ David December 5, 2020 5:44 AM
“A promise that Integrity in Public Life Bill is coming.”
(Quote):
Caddle said that agreement needed to be reached where it was understood that integrity legislation was not just for Government, but extended to the private sector where they too would be subjected to the same sanctions as public officials. (Unquote).
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Just another load of diversionary political bullshit!
There are already a wide range of laws (including the Companies Act) to govern the behaviour of the private sector.
The ‘challenge’ for Barbados is NOT the need for more laws but the application and enforcement of the existing laws without fear or favour; that is, ‘Fairly’.
If the law enforcement agencies cannot deal with the large number of uninsured vehicles (including the large gang of motor bike bandits) on the 2X3 country’s roads how on earth can they be expected to enforce laws to ‘police’ white collar ‘colluding’ criminals both in the public and private sectors?
“There are already a wide range of laws (including the Companies Act) to govern the behaviour of the private sector.”
they are always telling the public lies complete with misdirection….but I didn’t SEE NOT one minority racist or crook defending Donville, bet ya he can’t call up any of them either, not now and not in the future, although he made it his priority to put them before the people who elected him…they have no time for losers who is also black, but frauds will never learn that….even if they see it themselves in letters as tall as the empire state building.
I do not engage in the white/Indian conversation for a simple reason.
It may be simplistic thinking on my part but I believe that with blacks being the vast majority and with political power for over 50 years, these inequalities continue to exist because of our failing of our black political leadership. It is not the white/Indian fault that we are unable to make progress, it is the fault of the two sets of jokers that we elect every five years.
Their laws and policies are not meant to liberate blacks and tend to enriched others We continue to pretend to be a two party state, whilst others groups stop pretending to have that binary split; Mark Malone and company thrives in B or D.
Keep this in mind.. It takes effort to keep a man down; unrestrained he can change his position; tied down his actions are limited.
Free your minds and free yourselves
It is not my intention to throw shade to the blogmaster. I am glad that he is still a believer
Let me throw out a few phrases as we have seen this promise repeated over and over
” A promise is comfort to a fool”
“Fool me once shame on you, fool me twice shame on me”
“The proof of the pudding is in the eating
Let torture a phrase
“Insanity is hearing the same lie over and over and believing it”
A word to the wise is sufficient
https://barbadostoday.bb/2020/12/03/bar-association-supports-changes-to-legal-profession-act/
At some stage, (I hope) all of us are passionate lovers whispering sweet nothings into the ears of our partners.
This woman has been repeating this speech like 20 years now. Sisyphus was more productive
Excerpts from BT
“The BBA welcomes recent comments by the Honourable Attorney General to the effect that legislation is coming to deal more effectively with attorneys-at-law who misappropriate clients’ funds. For many years, the BBA has advocated for a more efficient and robust disciplinary regime.
“The new legislation is not only timely but overdue. It is possible that recent cases have been the catalyst to bring the issue to the fore once again,” Smith-Millar said.
She recalled that in 2016 the BBA submitted feedback on a wide range of proposed changes to the Legal Profession Act, but noted that, “nothing came of that draft legislation”.
She said that draft and the recommendations had again been submitted to the Attorney General and the new Chief Justice Patterson Cheltenham for further consideration.
—————————–xx———————————
If you are going to tell me what her powers are or what she can or cannot do, then you missed the point. She has been a longtime player in the charade for years.
Changes are coming. The people are becoming increasingly demanding. But we have some work to do on ourselves to keep it going to the end. Otherwise we will revert to status quo when the waters calm ever so slightly. We must not stop until the job is done!
Onward and upwards, Barbados!
“Keep this in mind.. It takes effort to keep a man down; unrestrained he can change his position; tied down his actions are limited. Free your minds and free yourselves.”
Should be recommended as an additional BU motto.
Whenever I hear of an Integrity Bill the title of the Supremes hit “you keep me hanging on” comes to mind. In the fall of 2007 David Thompson made a speech to a group of Bajans assembled at a hotel in Mississauga, Ontario that if the DLP was elected his Gov’t would introduce a Bill under the heading “Integrity in Public life” within six months of being elected. This was music to the ears of those who had assembled as many of them were being bombarded by tales of profligacy by members of the then BLP Gov’t.
I don’t have to detail what has transpired since then and in 2020 and some of us are still hanging on and hanging in but we are resilient lot and sometime come hell/ highwater/pandemic or Republic we will agitate for an Integrity Bill.
The cheap laugh brigade reporting for duty
“We drafted an integrity bill, but somebody stole the copy”
“Did you say integrity? I heard thievery?”
“Speaker did you say integrity? I heard get the tea”
“Did you say integrity? I heard, it is gritty”
I think my brain just shut down and is spewing random nonsense. Will try to reboot.
@ Theo at 12 :55 PM
Welcome to the club. My brain has been overwhelmed by the abundance of outpourings coming from normally sharp and entertaining commenters. I believe it has to do with COVID-19 lock downs and the consequential effects on our sense of what is important.
I have enormous respect for Ezra Alleyne, but it looks as if he has not looked at the theory of constitutional government since his university days in the 1960s.
The Head of State (the Queen or her representative) does not head up the Executive; the Executive is head up by the Cabinet, in a parliamentary democracy.
The Head of State’s functions are ceremonial, even in the signing off of Bills to turn them in to Acts. S/he is the embodiment of what we call the State, that mysterious institution that has no real existence, apart from the sophistication of how powers are exercised.
It is the State (or Crown) which prosecutes a wrongdoer; it is the State (or Crown) which owns property. In shot, think of the idea of the State in much the same way we think of a person having a mind.
Where in the body is the mind? Yet we talk about it with such confidence that it appears as if we can magic it in to existence. To put too much emphasis on the Queen’s Speech is to misunderstand both the speech and who delivers it.
When the Head of State says ‘my government’, what s/he is saying is that the government; the Head of State is only the echo of what is being proposed. It has not a single jot on the government’s programme.
It is ceremonial, not influential, not of any legal significance. It is like wearing black and white to a funeral; if you do not the dead can still be buried. It is ceremony, like soldiers marching up and down in fancy uniforms, and shouting at each other.
I can understand why he could have such a mistaken view of our constitutional arrangement, since a strong prime minister can usurp the powers of parliament and of the Head of State.
We have seen that recently with Mottley, both at Owen Arthur’s funeral – which officially was a State Funeral, therefore should have been head by the Governor General – and the Independence Day, a state occasion. We have also seen the abuse of the Governor General during the Queen’s Speech with 52 pages or rambling, rhetorical stuff that could have been delivered in at most 45 minutes, rather than the near three hours it took.
Mottley gets away with this nonsense because the grand figures of Barbados politics would not whisper in her ears when she is misbehaving.
Then he gets reality mixed up with constitutionality. If you have a 30/0 (29/1) legislature, a Cabinet that is subservient to the prime minister, a Chief Justice appointed by the Prime Minister, then we have a dictatorship? Or do we?
Should not judicial appointment s be by an independent Judicial Appointments Committee? How can there be a rule of law independent to dictatorial rule when the laws are made by the prime ministerially-controlled Legislature and Executive, the judiciary is headed up by a Chief Justice appointed by the prime minister, and with a overwhelming majority in parliament, the prime minister can amend the constitution at a whim?
Then he comes in with some waffle about the constitution effectively guaranteeing security of tenure of judges. Plse explain that in plain English.
Are Barbadian judge, like those of the US Supreme Court, guaranteed jobs for life, or like the UK Supreme Court, their jobs are guaranteed until thy reach a retirement age? Which is it? What happened to the previous Chief Justice? Did the BLP come to power determined to remove the DLP appointed Chief Justice?
As a leading and long-standing advocate, I am not surprised that Mr Alleyne is giving a greater importance to the doctrine of precedence than most legal theorists will. Judges interpret law, not make it.
There is a set procedure for understanding the intentions of parliament in law making. You go first to the social problems that necessitated the call for a new law; then you go to the discussion document issued by parliament; then the responses; then to the Bill, the parliamentary debate, then the final Act.
If the court’s interpretation of the background to the legislation does not accord with that development, then there is a need for an amended Act.
Mr Alleyne’s weekly pieces are useful in that they force people to look closely at constitutionalism, rather than the theatre of the courts. But I hope he is not influencing young minds.
My soul brother, Adrian Greene hits the spot again! Just like drinking milk with the Draytons Two.
And he is right about that spouge reaction. Never ceases to lift my spirits. First comes the broad smile as I recognise the opening bars, then comes the singing at the top of my lungs. It speaks to my Bajan soul. And I wonder what happened? How did we let that gem slip through our fingers?
And my soul cries out –
“NO! FOREIGN IS NOT BETTER!”
@Donna
It is better if locals have been encultrated to believe it is so. This is the kernel of the issue we have to unpack to move forward.
As usual Ezra Alleyne makes an in depth comment on recent events in our blessed country. He uses his column as an educative tool. Some of us commenters can learn a thing or two about exposition. We have a tendency in public conversations to criticize without understanding the social and political reasons for the establishment of state structures.
Donna December 5, 2020 8:15 AM
William Skinner,
“I, being a fanatical “come yuh” convert and one who lives ignorant and enslaved on the 2×3 barren rock, bereft of hope and in need of urgent counselling to help me to distinguish my ass from my elbow, humbly bow before all overseas Bajans whose vastly superior brains enabled them to escape from a terrible fate in Barbados living among the savages to an enlightened and perfect life among the white people.“ (Quote)
@ Donna
I respectfully think you have made a mistake by sending such a post addressed to me. I have never referred to Barbados as a 2×3 anything. I don’t know why you would direct anything like that to me. I have written nothing to you or anybody else that deserves such a response. This is at least a month or more that I have not made any comments regarding overseas or fellow Barbadians living at home.
I don’t indulge in such phrases as you have stated above.
Thanks
Peace
PS .The very last post that I addressed to you was why I use the word “ Peace” at the end of my posts. And that was only by way explanation.
New Spouge songs ahould be created and arrangerd by our best musicians.
There has not been enough done to promote this genre of Bajan music.
This instrumental version of Spouge is top class.
William…ignore the ignoramuses who weren’t even born in Barbados and could never be so disrespectful to any white or other who makes suggestions or have opinions relating to the upliftment of the people for economic and social progress in the UK, they would probably deport her ass just for her impertinence…just speak to people who live in UK and they will tell you.
@ WURA
Keep up the good work. I honestly think all of us are in this together.
Peace
William…we have been trying for years before these jokers showed up and think they can change a narrative when many of us have receipts to pull out about what we’re saying, that we can show and don’t have to talk about ..”beliefs” not when we got proof in black and white.
i came and found people like u on this blog and outside of the banter etc, never took it upon myself to tell anyone living in the diaspora or on the island that they should not contribute with an opinion, idea or radical information that is needed right now, we might dispute this or that, but that’s a normal part of arriving at some semblance of a solution….but these, when they don’t want to hear intelligent discourse they believe they can bully people to shut up….and most times don’t know what the hell they’re talking about.
on another note, things are moving forward as they should, hope you have been checking out other platforms..
on another note, things are moving forward as they should, hope you have been checking out …..international platforms..
William Skinner,
No, you did not make those comments. But others have. Just showing it to you.
As for Wonder Woman, I would have her know that I am a third generation rebel (my guess is longer than that). My grandfather stopped the school from TRYING to beat my mother into singing God Save the Queen in the 1940s. She was not even 10 years old. My mother went to England in 1962 as an eighteen year old girl and gave the white man as good as she got and even better. Nuff smart lip and on one occasion she bust a white patient’s ass for spitting on her. I have told that story, one of the many I could tell on BU.
At Q.C. we had many white teachers. A Mrs. Gilmore was mentioned here just last week. I think she was probably the same one who pulled my folded arms from across my chest on the way to assembly when I still young enough to be wearing a tunic. My response was to look into her eyes and put them right back up. The school rules did not permit her to put her hands on me. She got the message and used her voice instead. Then I complied in accordance with the rules. And this was after I turned my back on the queen’s motorcade in 1976. My friends and I also took over the white retreat by the tennis courts. Labelled the benches “South Africa”. Started a war of words after watching Roots. We did all that and escaped without punishment. Nobody wanted to deal with us. They knew we could represent ourselves and they would be exposed. But we earned a reputation at Q.C. When the overseer type Colleen Winter-Brathwaite took over from Elsie she said she had been warned about us and she gave us the name – The Rabble Rousers.
Do you know what audacity it took to behave like that at Q.C. in the 70s? I have been confronting racist whites and the system since childhood.
I also belonged to a political group with some serious militants at the age of eighteen. Some of them were Marxists. The young lady who brought me aboard is Bobby Clarke’s niece. I still have her Angela Davis books on my shelf.
So piss off, you stupid woman! My grandfather, my mother and I have been taking a stand against the stuff you are now jumping up and down about since the 1940s.
We lived it! Never bowed! Never will!
I will leave you with another of my mother’s choice titbits.
Once another white patient asked what the hell she was doing in England. My mother, ever quick of tongue, had the perfect reply –
“I have come to practise on you as a guinea pig so I can go back home and take care of my people properly.”
And that is precisely what she did! She gave them her all and sometimes brought them home. After retirement she took care of anyone in the neighbourhood who asked. Dressing wounds, putting in drops, bathing some and literally pulling the shit out of an old neighbour’s ass who suffered with terrible constipation.
THAT IS THE EXAMPLE I HAD!
And so I devoted all my time for more than a decade to community work even mentoring at the Juvenile facility and following up after release to the point of standing up to the police at Central police station for unfairing my mentee.
I left them speechless. I sat in my car after dark for half an hour, with only a pregnant woman as company, in The Orleans where shooting deaths occurred even this year just to prevent them from finding him hiding out and giving him a beating. I took him in as he said that is the only way he was going. He TRUSTED ME to protect him. And I did. Little, petite me! Bloody fearless when necessary! Or when angry! Just as mad as my mad ass mother!
Not stand up to white people shit. I bought a car from Simpson Motors. They NEVER kept the parts in stock. Wanted me to wait for six weeks or have it sourced and pay more than twice the amount. One night, carless, I walked to Oistins alone. I walk or drive when I am angry. Even if it is midnight on a lonely road. But even though it was only eight, I got attacked by a would be rapist. Tripped him up and he ended up on the ground with me sitting on him. I jumped up still holding a grocery bag in each hand. Refused to run. I walked and HE got up and ran.
Went into Simpson Motors next morning and ripped hell. White manager was summoned from upstairs. Tore into him too. Told him I would tell everybody I knew not to buy a car from Simpson’s. He apologised profusely and repeatedly. Never had to wait for a part after that.
And you dare to tell me to do something useful with my nuisance life and that I am a coward who would not stand up to white people?
You stupid, stupid woman!
You may post a lot and that can also be useful. I act without even thinking. That’s why I don’t think of myself as an activist. To me, I am just living a normal life.
Because, having grown up the lone black in a white neighbourhood from six weeks old ( 🙄) a white person is no big deal!
Effing idiot!
Did they deport my mother, you ass? She did not even lose her job!
Boy, I gotta go! The blood is pounding in my head. I can hear it in my ears! That stupid bitch got me so damn angry. She is not worth it.
Bloody stupid bitch!
Mia getting us in a debt trap…
https://youtu.be/d7KEp9wuFSE
Mia has sold out Barbados to the IMF; World Bank/ Western Imperialist .
https://youtu.be/aSJxbH_hfaE
I don’t need any biography from idiots, am not going to read it, waste of energy, I tend to conserve mine….hope the blood does more than pound.
Why the developing world ( including Barbados) remains trapped in debt to the western financial system ( Ponzi schemes).
https://youtu.be/s9K07n0__80
@ Mr. Hal Austin,
You said, and de ole man quotes
“…I can understand why he (Ezra Alleyne the man whom yo may remember as one of the earliest BLP lawyers debarred in the 70’s?) could have such a mistaken view of our constitutional arrangement, since a strong prime minister can usurp the powers of parliament and of the Head of State.
We have seen that recently with Mottley, both at Owen Arthur’s funeral – which officially was a State Funeral, therefore should have been head by the Governor General – and the Independence Day, a state occasion.
We have also seen the abuse of the Governor General during the Queen’s Speech with 52 pages or rambling, rhetorical stuff that could have been delivered in at most 45 minutes, rather than the near three hours it took.”
Today you have spoken a gem of truth that will go missing in the melee that is ensuing around you.
Today you have highlighted how this so called luminary Ezra Alleyne IS SINGING FOR HIS SUPPER AT THE ADIPOSE LIPS OF THE DICTATOR MIA MUGABE!
Today you have deconstructed the literary hog shyte that Ezra Alleyne posted in this submission that should get a blog of its own here on Barbados Underground BUT IT WILL NOT!
Because these truths you have enunciated though self evident ARE DANGEROUS!
You broke down every single line of the Alleyne Lie that supports the coming Republic Dictatorship for Life of Mugabe Mottley!
You have shown how Mugabe Mottley has merged all three powers under her single rule.
Like her hero Putin
While stupid bajans looking at Covid-19 vaccines and Nelson Moving and Virtual We Gaddering
WHILE GETTING BULLED!
Boy, I gotta go! The blood is pounding in my head. I can hear it in my ears! That stupid bitch got me so damn angry. She is not worth it.
Bloody stupid bitch!
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
THIS IS COMING FROM A LOCAL WOMAN THAT LIKES TO PORTRAY HERSELF ALWAYS AS A VICTIM AND PLEASE FEEL SORRY FOR ME.
HAS SUCH DISRESPECTFUL WORDS TO ANOTHER WOMAN,
WONDERS NEVER CEASE.
VERY CHILDISH AND PETTY.
MUST BE AN EFFECT OF THE 2 x 3 ISLAND.
PURE PURE HYPOCRISY..
@ Piece
You said” Today you have spoken a gem of truth that will go missing in the melee that is ensuing around you.” You are correct about @ Hal superbly written article.
@Hal
A very impressive piece. I don’t comprehend how anybody can seriously praise the pitiful BLP propganda columns of Ezra Alleyene. Alleyne is now a mere shadow of the promise he showed when he entered politics and the country was impressed with him as a rising star on the political scene.
@Donna,
The clarification is appreciated. Thanks
Peace
@ Donna & the Draytons have it wrong about milk.
https://youtu.be/XT5IczyhFGQ
@William
Thanks. I have great appreciation for Ezra, that generation just below John Connell and Calvin Alleyne; and it was enhanced when he started teaching law before returning to Barbados.
Sometimes he gets it, not so much wrong, but fails to keep up. There are two sides to the law, the theory and the practice. In Barbados we are familiar with the practice: robes, theatre, etc. But we are lacking in discussing the theory. Often we get the two mixed up.
But for the uninitiated, law and finance are twins; the law of contract, pensions law, regulation, etc. The same with sports/entertainment and the law. Law is a popular second degree in the UK.
There is also an ignorance of specialist law; if you want to know about welfare law, will you go to a young man or woman in a robe, who came out of college two months ago, or to an experienced social worker?
If you want to know about industrial relations law will you go to a leading QC who has only done criminal work or to a leading trade union official? A right to appear before a judge and knowledge of the law are two different things.
But, on BU, even questions of as objective as law and the constitution become party political or personal issues. It is the Bajan Condition.
@ Hal
I had the opportunity of hearing a young Alleyne speak on his party’s platforms and in Parliament. I remember him driving his superbly kept title Morris Minor, quickly building a reputation as a fine lawyer and future PM. Always smiling articulate and affable . I don’t know the man that has reduced himself to a propaganda machine, using his legal writing skills to basically mislead readers.
As for those who come on BU positing everything in pure party positions, it looks like the sheer stamina of @Mariposa is getting the better of her opponents ,on the other side , at this time. After all who can defend a PM , who calls workers protests “ spectacles” and tells them to behave properly for “ outsiders”.
For me there is nothing more relaxing than seeing the political cannibals devour each other. That’s what they do best!
Peace
@William
You are being very dramatic. Which prime minister or leader of an enterprise would not appeal for calm at a difficult time for the country or business? Should she have said the opposite? Context man!
Defend the workers we must but uneasy lies the head that wears a crown.
@David
I know , what I heard and read what my Prime Minister said. She needs to apologise to the workers.
You are incapable of defending the working class. I have all your responses to attacks on the corporate class. You have defended them 85% of the time. You have no authority to tell me about context. You only know about that when it comes to the BLP.
Let me stay emotional. Thank you very much.
Peace
@William
The Prime Minister overseas the country, not just the working class. The job of any prime minister is to ensure the environment of the whole country supports all classes. The blogmaster like you can have any opinion he damn well pleases.
(Quote):
Defend the workers we must but uneasy lies the head that wears a crown.
(Unquote).
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
That piece of timely advice also applied when a ‘blue(s)’ head wearing a yellow crown (of economic thorns) was served with a letter of ultimatum and over 5,000 marched in Bridgetown headed by a pied piper dressed in the ‘politically colourful’ white.
The more administrations change the more they do the same crap.
‘Those who live in glass houses should not throw stones (even from the shade).’
Karma can be a bitch (of any colour)!
@Miller
This iOS true and you and others have discussed the tactics of opposition politics compared to when in government.
#keepingitrealalways