Minister of home affairs and Information Wilfred Abrahams says Barbadians have a right to view what is happening in Parliament “live”, so they can understand whether the representations being made on their behalf are reflective of their will.
He suggested this was important, rather than the public having to rely on the press. It was one of the reasons he welcomed a recommendation in the report of the Parliamentary Reform Commission for the appointment of communications officers to be attached to the House of Assembly.
Pointing out the job would be “to distill down the important aspects of debates coming out of Parliament”, Abrahams told the House on Tuesday this was preferable as “sometimes the press will pick up the most inflammatory thing; sometimes a whole debate may go on and the press may choose the points that most interest it”.
“As the minister responsible for information, I have had colleagues who were dissatisfied with coverage in the press because the press missed the most salient points of their debate and I made the point to people if there is something to be highlighted, the part that you want the public to take away, let us know that and we will advise accordingly. But that should not be left to the whim and fancy of what are actually third-party actors.
“So there is a recommendation that you have communication persons employed by Parliament,
to distill down the debates so that persons can actually get the salient points without bias one
way or the other.”
Abrahams railed against Opposition Leader Ralph Thorne’s marathon reply to the last Budget and said there was a recommendation in the Parliamentary Reform Commission’s report, “that allows people if they need to next time, to turn it off and not have a fear of missing the one brain that might have come out of a ten-hour diatribe”.
The Christ Church East MP also called for better compensation for members of the Senate and as well as an increase in the constituency allowance paid to elected parliamentarians for the running of their constituency offices.
“Compensation of senators is woefully inadequate,” he stated, adding, “the stipend for senators contemplated the time when the Senate was made up of independently wealthy persons”.
He contended the work of the Senate “is no less important than the work of this Chamber and the compensation is an insult that is visited upon the senators”.
As for the constituency allowance, he maintained the current payment of $2 550 paid since 1999 was woefully inadequate, leaving the constituency representative to pull their own pocket to meet the many demands of constituents.
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