Changes afoot in Government

By By Alan Markoff and James Dimond, alan@cfp.ky, jdimond@cfp.ky

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The movement of Director of Planning Kenneth Ebanks to a Ministry of Planning position was just one of the many changes announced by Leader of Government Business McKeeva Bush Thursday.

Leader of Government Business McKeeva Bush speaks at Thursdays press briefing, while his deputy, Rolston Anglin, looks on. Photo: James Dimond

Speaking at the new government’s first Cabinet press briefing, Mr. Bush said Mr. Ebanks was being moved to the Ministry of Planning to oversee the creation of a National Development Plan, which would include a national sewerage system.

The sewerage system would start for all of George Town, something Mr. Bush said should have happened decades ago.

Mr. Ebanks’ move takes effect immediately and Assistant Director of Planning Haroon Pandohie will become the Acting Director of Planning, with a recommendation from the government that he be slotted permanently in the post, subject to civil service hiring procedures.

Mr. Bush said a wholesale review of the Cayman Islands’ planning laws and regulations would promote better urban planning and encourage more inward investment.

“The current planning laws and regulations are based on principles from the 1900s and are therefore out of date,” he said. “The bureaucracy is so high and tight that people are turned away and take their money somewhere else.”

He said architect Burns Conolly would chair a committee tasked with reviewing the laws and reporting back to him in early December.

Mr. Bush also named several other important board chairmanships. Jude Scott, who retired as a partner from the accounting firm Ernst & Young earlier this year, was named the chairman of Cayman Airways; Paul Byles was named the chairman of the Cayman Development Bank; Kenneth Hydes was named chairman of the Cayman Turtle Farm; and Garth Arch was named chairman of the Trade and Business Licensing Board.

Mr. Bush confirmed the government had agreed, along with the Ministry of Education, to recommend to the University College of the Cayman Islands’ Board of Governors the appointment of former Minister of Education Roy Bodden as president.

Another major announcement made by Mr. Bush during the briefing involved a “pension contributions holiday”, which he said the UDP would propose in the Legislative Assembly as soon as possible.

With regard to the projects to build two new high schools, Mr. Bush said the contractors had advised government about delays in finishing the buildings and that Clifton Hunter High School would not be completed until June 2010 and the new John Gray High School would not be completed until January 2011.

Mr. Anglin said afterwards that the projections related only to the base buildings, and did not include the fit out of interior fixtures and furnishings; something he said took considerable time.

Since there will not be enough space to hold the estimated number of students for the 2010/11 school year without the new schools opening on time, Mr. Anglin said the government would have to push to see the projects completed.

“We’re going to have to make it happen,” he said. “We need both of those schools coming on line for that school year.”

Mr. Bush also fielded questions from the press on a variety of topics. When asked about the current controversy revolving around Financial Secretary Kenneth Jefferson and the large changes in government economic projections over a short period of time, Mr. Bush defended the official member by saying he was only doing what the previous government had told him to do. He said that was the way every government operated and he blamed the previous People’s Progressive Movement administration for the big discrepancy in economic projections.

“While they said they were going to cut [spending] to look good in front of the electorate, they didn’t cut spending; they cut figures,” he said.

Mr. Bush also confirmed that Pirates Week would change, both in name and in theme. Although he said a final name had not been decided, he envisioned either Heritage Week or Cultural Week. Instead of a pirates landing, Mr. Bush said there could be something like a mock landing of turtling schooners, which he said used to be a big thing culturally.

Mr. Bush said it was time for the end of Pirates Week.

“It’s had it day,” he said. “It was a good idea when the late national hero [Jim Bodden] started it, but times have changed.”

Mr. Bush said the pirates theme not only had negative implications locally, but internationally as well. He said was asked recently in New York about what connection the Cayman Islands had with piracy.

The Minister of Tourism also questioned the effectiveness of Pirates Week as a tourism draw and said proponents of the festival should be asked about its usefulness.

“Ask them how many tourists do you see out there if that’s what they think it’s doing,” he said. “Ask them how much value has it added to us.”