IMPACT ON BARBADOS

GOVERNANCE ADVISORY BOARD SET UP IN BARBADOS

A Governance Advisory Board has been established by the Barbados Cabinet to deal with a number of issues, including Freedom of Information, Defamation and Integrity draft Bills.

This is according to Chairman of the Board, Senator Orlando Marville, who was speaking at a press conference at Government Headquarters on Tuesday.

The other members of the Board are: The Very Rev. Dean Dr. Frank Marshall; the Permanent Secretary (Special Assignments) Prime Minister’s Office; Captain Randolph Straughan; Calvin Springer; Shantal Munroe-Knight; Professor Eudine Barriteau and Attorney-at-law Monique Taitt.

According to Marville, the Board would also be looking at a constitutional amendment related to the tenure and power of the Prime Minister; and examining the role of the Ombudsman and a proposed Contractor General.

He noted that Legal Services Advisor, Professor Albert Fiadjoe, had been retained to draft the legislation, and the aforementioned Bills should be ready by yearend.

The Chairman explained that the promised Freedom of Information Act would make it possible for "all citizens and other people of particular interest to access most information … because we are trying to exclude only specific matters, like national security, and also possibly some forms of personal information might be held in that way.

The idea is to free up information, so that you have a much wider source and you have greater transparency on government’s handling of information. The process is meant to be handled through the Barbados Government Information Service and there should be a Commissioner of Information who will make a determination where there are grey areas on what is allowable and what is not. We are hoping that most is allowable," Senator Marville stated.

With respect to the Defamation Act, he pointed out that the current legislation did not allow for persons to freely express an opinion. "If you voice an opinion and it cannot be proved to be fact, it doesn’t mean that you have done any malice to the person about whom you are talking, and I think we want to have something in that Act where malice has to be established," he stressed.

Addressing the issue of Integrity Legislation, Minister in the Prime Minister’s Office, Senator Maxine McClean, who was present at the press briefing, pointed out that its critical aspects would relate to Ministers of government and senior public servants demonstrating integrity.

"That would be facilitated by declaration of assets, for example, because in terms of decision making, a critical area would be the ability of those persons to demonstrate that they have not through their office, acquired assets illegally, etc.

"That certainly is an area of critical interest to the public and we would want to demonstrate that there is proper compliance and observation of proper procedures in carrying out their duties," she said.

McClean also stressed that they would have to look at persons outside of the public service, "because in any effort to compromise integrity there will be multiple parties involved and therefore we also have to look at the issue of parties to any kind of corruption."

The Governance Advisory Board intends to have as much input as possible into all of its processes. As a result, when Cabinet has signed off on the draft legislation, town hall meetings, specific meetings with the press, the social partners and other specific stakeholders will be convened.

(Caribbean Net News)