The PLP pays a lot of lip service to transparency and accountability but, based on their actions, one has to question their actual commitment. The PLP leadership refuses to allow the Public Accounts Committtee (PAC) of the House of Assembly to meet in public – an abberation among modern democracies. And, it appears that the [...]
Entries Tagged as 'Accountability'
Squelching Accountability
December 14th, 2009 · Comments Off · Accountability, Bermuda Politics, Transparency
PATI Retroactivity
December 4th, 2009 · 1 Comment · Accountability, Transparency
The Premier has taken an about-face on the issue of PATI retroactivity, commenting: “I wish to advise this honourable House that when I invite Cabinet’s further consideration of the bill it will contain a recommendation that it consider the issue of retroactivity. Personally, I wish it to be clearly understood that I am in favour [...]
Post Office
December 2nd, 2009 · 1 Comment · Accountability
The Bermuda Post Office has been going through an exercise to get householders to properly install mailboxes and use correct addresses. This, in itself, is entirely logical and needed to be done. However, the project has ended up being controversial as the Post Office has “returned to sender” large volumes of mail with minor inaccuracies [...]
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Deliberate Distortion of Reality
December 1st, 2009 · Comments Off · Accountability, Transparency
Senator Walton Brown is all over the news and talk radio decrying the public complaints about weaknesses in the draft PATI law as a “deliberate distortion of reality”. He went on to describe how the section to allow the Minister to amend the PATI law by regulation was only intended to simplify updates to the [...]
Santa Bump and Grind
November 30th, 2009 · Comments Off · Accountability
Santa Claus visited Hamilton this weekend, with big crowds of families and Christmas cheer. I think his eyes popped out at the sheer numbers of glittering majorettes who were clamouring to escort him around the city streets. I think he was also surprised by the dance moves as well, which were (cough), shall we say [...]
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Deadline for PATI Input
November 30th, 2009 · Comments Off · Accountability, Transparency
This afternoon is the deadline for public input to the PATI “public access to information” bill. I encourage you to make a submission, no matter how brief. The PATI bill may be found here: Bermuda PATI Draft law [pdf] Bermuda PATI Consultation Handbook [pdf] Submissions should be directed to The Cabinet Secretary at pati@gov.bm. The [...]
Bribery
October 28th, 2009 · Comments Off · Accountability, Bermuda Politics
As a small jurisdiction, many of Bermuda’s laws have not been tempered by the fast flow of legal challenges seen in larger countries. This leads, from time to time, to unhappy circumstances where the law has not kept up … and controversial deeds can only be officially characterised as being “unethical but not illegal”. A [...]
International Input on PATI
October 27th, 2009 · 2 Comments · Accountability, Bermuda Politics, Transparency
Article 19 has published a commentary on the proposed Bermuda freedom of information bill (aka public access to information or PATI). Article 19 is a highly-respected international human rights organisation with a specific focus on the defence and promotion of freedom of expression and freedom of information worldwide. While praising Bermuda for tackling PATI, they [...]
PATI Whistleblow
October 26th, 2009 · 1 Comment · Accountability, Bermuda Politics, Transparency
As widely reported, the Bermuda draft freedom of information law (aka PATI) allows great scope for Government to sit on information. For example, the law proposes a lengthy (2-3 year) implementation period and will only apply to information collected after its effective date. There is a long list of specific exemptions, as well as vague [...]
Accountability Brown
October 20th, 2009 · Comments Off · Accountability
The Premier’s new press secretary has a finely tuned sense of NewSpeak. He says Dr. Brown won’t attend meetings with the Governor and Police Commissioner because he must have direct operational control so “we have complete responsibility for policing and Bermudians can hold us accountable for how we spend their hard-earned dollars.” Further, he says [...]
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