Symmonds calls for public health inspector update

Has the role of public health inspectors in Barbados changed?

This question was posed by Barbados Labour Party representative for St. James Central, Kerrie Symmonds, as he joined the debate on the $4.6 million supplementary which will go towards the government’s debushing programme.

Acknowledging the vexing challenge of landowners not keeping their lots clean, Symmonds stated that the answers to this problem have already been outlined last year, noting that the cost to clear these properties by government can be affixed to the delinquent owners land tax bill.

However, he stated that there is also the challenge of enforcement.

“If we accept that all of the negatives can flow from these overgrown lots and if we accept that we are not going to look for millions every year in order to maintain Barbados in a satisfactory state, then we have to be doing some enforcement along the way and some preventative medicine will have to be applied.”

He recalled the days of public health officers coming around from house to house, ladle in hand, and noted that while he is unsure of officers traversing his own neighbourhood, he has not been made aware of any large scale work in the constituency which he represents.

“That is not to say they are there and not doing work.

The question I want to ask is how many do we have? How are they employed across Barbados, in each constituency; how many are at working on any given day, attached to whatever polyclinic or where their base is? Has there been a change from how the public health inspectors would have operated 20 years ago and how they are operating now?” he queried.

“These are things we have to talk through. If there is that there has been a shift in thinking and policy...if it is that changes took place, let us not cast aspersions at who made the change, but let us look and see whether those changes were sensible and whether they fit for the purpose that faces us today.”

He lamented that the challenge of overgrown lots are not being solved out of the pockets of private landowners but on the backs of taxpayers, who are saddled with the bill.
(JH)