PM: DLP READY!

THE Democratic Labour Party (DLP) is ready, willing, able and determined to carry on governing this country after the next general election.

This is the assurance of the Party’s President and Prime Minister of Barbados, the Rt. Hon Freundel Stuart.

Addressing the DLP’s 62nd Anniversary Gala and Awards ceremony on Saturday night, he made it clear that this will not be done by the practice of any conjuring tricks.

“We don’t have to lie to the population. We don’t need all the tactics that I see being played out from other quarters,” he pointed out.

“All we need to do is to tell the people of Barbados the facts about the record of the Democratic Labour Party. Because facts have their own power and when you are confronted with lies and distortion – the most powerful weapon against lies and against distortion is the truth. The most powerful weapon is a fact and that is what we have been doing in the Democratic Labour Party.”

The Prime Minister admitted to the full house gathered at the DLP’s George Street Headquarters that his administration has faced challenges ever since being in office.

However, he reminded them that those challenges did not prevent them from passing the Employment Rights Act; as well as passing the Cultural Industries Act, opening a new sector for Barbados to earn foreign exchange and to find outlets for the talents of its young people.

“And we have kept Barbados stable,” he said.

Prime Minister Stuart went onto explain that on the April 27, 1955, when the Democratic Labour Party was formed, the world was a completely different place. He also observed that when Barbados became independent in 1966 after being a colony of Great Britain for 339 years, it had a lot of catching up to do.

“All of the colonies in the Caribbean, all the English- and Spanish-speaking colonies – whether your colonial master was English, Spanish or Portuguese – when you got your independence you had a lot of catching up to do because at the heart of colonialism, at the heart of being a colony, was the fact that your colonial masters used you to promote their interests and in the process subordinated yours.”

According to him, Barbados therefore had to launch a serious attack on education, health, housing, social protection, land reform and law reform – all matters which are still being fought in 2017.

“Because you cannot undo what it took 339 years to create in just 50 years. That is why our patterns of public expenditure are what they are. That is why we spend so much money on education, health, housing, land reform and law reform.

“So, when you hear the protests from our critics that we have to try and get the economy right and the only way to get it right is to cut the expenditure – understand what expenditure they are talking about. They want expenditure cut on education, health, public transport, housing…,” he remarked.

“Practically every single English-speaking Caribbean country is waging the same battles which we here in Barbados have been waging, because we all have inherited the same set of conditions just with varying degrees of intensity.” (TL)