It has been a year since the Public Access to Information (PATI) Act was passed in the Bermuda Legislature. A year later, the law has not been put on the books and no commencement date has been given. There is no sign of “freedom of information act” preparation in any part of Government. The PLP [...]
Entries Tagged as 'Accountability'
Good Governance Act 2011
July 15th, 2011 · Comments Off · Accountability, Bermuda Politics
The Web has been around for 20 years now. It’s a pity the Bermuda Government has yet to use it to distribute the bills that have been tabled for debate in the House of Assembly, nevermind to inform the public regarding what happens in our Legislature. Government issued an RFP back in 2008 for a [...]
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Urgency
July 11th, 2011 · Comments Off · Accountability, Bermuda Politics
In the House of Assembly last Friday, Premier Cox said the PLP would urgently press forward with Good Governance legislation “to stamp any unethical behaviour out of her Government.” She added “that Bermuda has agreed in principle to be included in the UN Convention against Corruption.” The issue of good governance laws was raised with [...]
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Need to Go A Step Further
July 9th, 2011 · Comments Off · Accountability
The Premier yesterday spoke about some of the rainbows and unicorns that will spontaneously appear from her future but undefined “Good Governance” legislation. I’m all in favour of this. But we need to go a step further than encouraging good governance. We need to define what is bad behaviour as well. Let’s get “unethical but [...]
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Anti-Corruption Law Update
June 10th, 2011 · Comments Off · Accountability, Bermuda Politics, Reform
The Bermuda Parliament looks busy. But truth is, in my opinion, it’s not very productive. They appear to prefer holding catfights than actually moving a well-planned legislative agenda. It’s all about the “circus of the day”. And exercise financial oversight over public expenditures? Well. The facts speak for themselves: $1,000,000,000 in the hole and rising [...]
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Union Reports
April 13th, 2011 · Comments Off · Accountability
The Royal Gazette reports that the BIU has still not complied with the law (Trade Union Act 1965) regarding filing annual audits with the Registry General. In 2009 the paper reported that Government was troubled by a BIU filing covering the years 1999-2002 for insufficient detail as it rolled that 4 year span into one [...]
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Whither PATI
March 17th, 2011 · Comments Off · Accountability, Transparency
Premier Alex Scott introduced the idea of “public access to information” (PATI) aka “freedom of information” legislation for Bermuda in 2003. After years of inaction, the project staggered back to life in 2009 and a law was passed by the House of Assembly in 2010. However, the nascent law remains on ice and no timetable [...]
Recalibration
October 22nd, 2010 · Comments Off · Accountability, Transport
It can be argued Paula Cox is being given a pass card because “she’s gotta be better than this mess”. This, of course, overlooks the fact that she was Minister of Finance throughout much of this mess making. So when Minister Cox says that her solutions for Government will be based on “reform and recalibration” [...]
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Priorities
July 16th, 2010 · Comments Off · Accountability, Bermuda Politics
The PLP dropped the municipalities takeover as a bombshell late in Dr. Brown’s term. Many questions were raised about the huge sums allocated to law firms for the reform effort … yet there has been little visible evidence of consultation nor talk of reform. One has to wonder if this is about reform at all. [...]
After PATI
June 29th, 2010 · Comments Off · Accountability, Transparency
The long wait for Bermuda’s public access to information law continues. The NYT has an interesting article on India’s popular freedom of information access law pointing out that it may not have made a big dent in corruption, but it has given a powerful tool to citizens to resolve their complaints. There is, however, a [...]