PPM Objects To Budget Method

Hon Kurt Tibbetts	Hon McKeeva Bush

Thursday, May 6, 2004

Leader of the Opposition Hon Kurt Tibbetts has strenuously objected to the Annual Budget Statement being delivered with fewer than four days notice, thus preventing the Opposition the opportunity to submit parliamentary questions or motions.

According to People’s Progressive Movement (PPM) General Secretary, MLA Alden McLaughlin, the Clerk of the Legislative Assembly sent notice by email on Monday afternoon that the Budget Statement would be delivered by the Hon Financial Secretary on Friday, 7 May and that the Budget Debate would commence on Wednesday, 12 May.

In a letter dated 4 May to Acting Governor of the Cayman Islands, Hon James Ryan, Leader of the Opposition Hon Kurt Tibbetts protested the short announcement of the Budget process. “This means that, in breach of long-established parliamentary convention and practice in this jurisdiction, a proper Budget Meeting of the Legislative Assembly will not be convened,” he wrote. “Instead, in an unprecedented step, the Budget will be delivered during this inexplicably protracted Fifth Meeting of 2003, which commenced on 13 February, 2004 and continues still, notwithstanding that the House has not dealt with any business in two months.”

The Legislative Assembly Session is normally terminated following the November Meeting, with a new Session beginning in February or March of the following year, according to Mr Tibbetts. “Astonishingly, and for no publicly announced reason, this has not been done, and thus in May of 2004, we are still in the 2003 Session of the House,” he wrote. “In the absence of any explanation, we are regrettably driven to the conclusion that these irregularities are calculated to disadvantage the Opposition and reduce the opportunities for debate and inquiry into the Government’s conduct.”

Mr Tibbetts pointed out that, as a matter of procedure, questions must be submitted at least 10 days before the commencement of the meeting of the House, and motions five clear days before the meeting of the House begins. “This (the short notice) is most irregular and grossly unfair to the Opposition because it prevents us from being able to submit parliamentary questions or motions,” he wrote.

Saying that he understood the reluctance of the Government to have questions asked of its stewardship of the country in an election year, Mr Tibbetts maintained that it is the function of the Opposition to scrutinise the Government’s actions or inactions. “Whether the Government likes it or not, that is an important part of the purpose of Legislative Assembly,” he wrote. “Both the role of the Opposition and the institution of democratic government are seriously undermined if the Government is permitted to stifle the Opposition by manipulating the parliamentary process so as to preclude us from exercising the fundamental right to ask parliamentary questions.”

Mr Tibbetts claimed in the letter that the Government was conducting an “orchestrated effort… to handicap the role and function of the Opposition.”

Besides writing to the Acting Governor, Mr Tibbetts said that if the called Budget Meeting proceeded on such short notice, the PPM would lodge a complaint with the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association and “apprise the international media of the state of democracy in the Cayman Islands under the UDP (United Democratic Party) regime.”

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