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The first phase of Barbados’ new Geriatric Hospital is scheduled to take 18 months to construct at Waterford, St Michael, at a cost of over $100 million. The facility, which will replace the existing structure at Beckles Road, will comprise the main three-storey hospital with 300 beds, including an isolation ward and ten day rooms, a rehabilitation unit, two treatment rooms per floor, a rehab unit, an isolation ward, a …
Jameel-springerWilliam-duguidChris-gibbsJerome-walcottKirk-humphreyGeriatric-hospitalSenior-minister-dr-william-duguidPeople-empowerment-kirk-humphreyBeckles-roadNation-newsWere the current Barbados Light & Power (BL&P) rate application before the Fair Trading Commission (FTC) a purely public relations exercise, the company would likely not get a one per cent increase, far less the near 12 per cent it is seeking.The BL&P, for most of its 111 years of operation on the island, has enjoyed a stellar image as a corporate entity. Citizens held the company in high regard. It was known as a responsive utility, where complaints were addressed promptly, and its electricity services were extremely reliable.Important also was the perception that BL&P was one of the island’s best employers, where the pay was great, and employee turnover was unheard of. Many of these aspects of the company’s existence may still be true, but in recent years, it is difficult to deny that BL&P has fallen from the pinnacle it held.Yes, there have been applications for rate increases before in which the company stridently defended its requests and objectors were equally passionate in their rejection of those demands.However, something has changed. The public complaints have increased, and the dissatisfaction levels are going in the wrong direction for the utility company.It may be linked to the fact that only a sprinkling of Barbadians still own a stake in the company post the Emera takeover. The Canadian owners of BL&P will naturally be in an ongoing battle for the hearts and minds of Barbadians suspicious of a foreign corporate takeover of a highly prized local asset.
CanadaBarbadosBarbadiansCanadianWilliam-duguidEmeraHouse-of-assemblyFair-trading-commissionBarbados-lightSenior-minister-dr-william-duguidFor the second time in less than a week Senior Minister Dr William Duguid has publicly chastised the Barbados Light & Power Company (BL&P).This time around the Government Member of Parliament chided the BL&P for only “giving back” $4 million in the last 10 years, describing it as insufficient for a company that has earned “hundreds of millions of dollars” from Barbadians.Last Wednesday, the Senior Minister with responsibility for coordinating infrastructural projects, lambasted the BL&P for not upgrading its electrical poles, something which he said would have made the island’s electricity infrastructure more resilient in a natural disaster.He accused the company of lacking foresight and focusing on its bottomline above all else.However, while speaking in Parliament on Tuesday during debate on the Barbados Economic Recovery and Transformation (BERT) Plan 2022, Dr Duguid revealed that he had received a letter from the BL&P in response to those accusations.He said the BL&P contended it had lived up to its corporate responsibility to Barbados by donating money and equipment to the tune of $4 million, dating back to 2012.But in a stinging rebuttal, Dr Duguid said that amount of money was paltry compared to the BL&P’s profits.
BarbadosBarbadiansWilliam-duguidBarbados-light-power-companyParliament-onGovernment-member-of-parliamentSenior-minister-dr-william-duguidBarbados-lightPower-companyGovernment-memberSenior-ministerBarbados-economic-recoveryThe fact that we in Barbados have made it through the 2022 Atlantic Hurricane Season so far unscathed from a serious weather event, is a development for which all should be grateful.Pre-season forecasts from experts at the Colorado State University and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in the United States, predicted an active season with an updated outlook for a “well above-median October-November activity in the Caribbean”.It is for this reason that we must not become complacent with less than two months to go before the close of the season. The island was way out of the path of killer Hurricane Ian. However, our neighbours in Puerto Rico, Cuba, and parts of Florida, were not so lucky.The death and destruction of the weather system have been cataclysmic and the cost to rebuild is several billion dollars and growing.This is the backdrop for a larger debate of several issues related to our ability to prepare for the changing weather patterns that have become more dangerous and more difficult to predict with accuracy.In fact, the publication Scientific America accurately described the 2022 hurricane season as one that went from “quiet to a Power Keg”. Phil Klotzbach of Colorado State University described the early part of 2022 as “really, really dead” with no storms in August, which was the first time since 1997. He then described the abrupt change at the end of September as a “sudden flip”.
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