MORE MONEY FOR HOUSING AND ROADS IN 2025
SUPPLEMENTARY ESTIMATES PASSED
In the early morning of August 8, 2025, on the 79th birthday of the Prime Minister, Comrade Ralph, the House of Assembly passed the Supplementary Estimates and Supplementary Appropriation Bill, 2025, by a majority vote of 12 in favour of the government and two against, with no abstentions. Of the 14 members on the government side, Foreign Minister Augustus Stephenson was overseas on government business, and Senator Ashelle Morgan (the Deputy Speaker) was in the Speaker’s Chair owing to the fact that the substantive Speaker, Rochelle Forde, was also overseas. Thus, every member of the House on the government side available to vote, voted for the Motion on the Estimates and the Bill. Sadly, pathetically, and irresponsibly, by the time the vote occurred, on a division, only two of the eight members of the opposition NDP stayed in the House; earlier six of them at various times had left the House for their respective homes or elsewhere. It was a grave dereliction of duty by Friday and his opposition colleagues on a matter of serious import. It truly reflects their unseriousness as parliamentary representatives, and to the requisites of governance.
The Estimates and the Bill, in the sum of $98.6 million dollars, delivered expenditure as follows: (i) $3 million, additionally, to cover the cost of accommodation and utility expenses for hotels/guesthouses/apartments to house just over 1,000 persons displaced by Hurricane Beryl; (ii) $41.73 million to provide additional funds to repair, reconstruct, or construct houses damaged or destroyed by Hurricane Beryl; (iii) $28.25 million to provide additional funds to rebuild roads under the existing Taiwan-loan project; (iv) $9.6 million from an existing Taiwan loan for the modern port project to accelerate the requisite works; (v) $16 million from an existing loan from the Caribbean Development Bank (CDB) for the modern port project to speed up further the works thereon.
In short, the only new monies sought by the government were $44,73 million, to be raised as “Local Loans” through bonds or other financial instruments to pay for the living expenses of displaced persons from Hurricane Beryl and to continue the housing programme post-Beryl. The new monies for the housing were occasioned by the slow delivery thus far of monies from the Saudi Fund for Development; without the new monies the repairs/rebuilding of people’s houses damaged or destroyed by Beryl would grind to a halt. Thus, how in the name of heavens could the opposition NDP or anyone else reasonably oppose the Estimates and Bill before the House? But the NDP found an ignominious and unprincipled political way to do it. It was an appalling spectacle: the NDP drove a further nail in their political coffins.
NDP’S BOGUS AND BAD-MINDED ARGUMENTS
Amidst all the meanderings, non sequiturs, irrelevancies, follies, lies, and distortions, the opposition NDP, in the words of the Opposition Leader, Lorraine Friday, could not support the Estimates and the Bill, centrally, because it does not trust the government with these monies a few months before the general elections. In other words, close down the construction of the port, the roads, and the housing programme, and have the landlords throw out the displaced persons from the rented accommodation. Total madness! Pure bad-mindedness mixed with partisan opposition politics! The interests of the people and the country mattered not to the uncaring NDP, devoid of love and empathy. As always, they were consumed by the lust, the hunger, the thirst for power, vainglory, and status positions. These puny men had their sordid motives exposed for the world to see.
ULP’S TRUST AND LOVE
Meanwhile, on display by the ULP members in Parliament was the warm embrace of love and caring for the people. Comrade Ralph completely demolished the absurd, partisanly-contrived issue of mistrust of the ULP government advanced by the NDP. Embedded in the DNA of the opposition NDP is the engendering of mistrust of the ULP government; after all, the NDP wants to replace the ULP in government; that is their principal mission. The NDP never trusted the ULP to build the Argyle International Airport or the Rabacca Bridge or the Modern Medical and Diagnostic Centre, or to carry out the Education Revolution, and so forth. But these projects were all done in the people’s interest. So, what’s new with the hypocritical Lorraine Friday, the Canadian who went home to Toronto on holidays soon after Beryl struck?
Comrade Ralph calmly and succinctly, with reason and facts, demonstrated that trust is built-up with the people through what you have done, what you are doing, and what you are likely to do. The Comrade detailed the mighty deeds done by the ULP government in its housing policies, generally, and specifically its rebuilding of houses for the people, always, after any natural disaster. By contrast the NDP never built one single house for the poor and the working people in its 17 years in office, 1984 to 2001! And when it was in office, the NDP left the poor and marginalised to fend for themselves, in respect of housing, after natural disasters.
Daily, the ULP shows its love for our people, especially the poor, and the disadvantaged. The ULP shows its love for the people; and the people return love and trust of the ULP. The fact that the NDP distrusts the ULP is neither here nor there. The people have repaid the ULP’s Labour love with electoral victories in 2001, 2005, 2010, 2015, and 2020; they will re-elect the ULP government in the soon-to-come general elections of 2025.
SOME NDP RUBBISH FROM THE DEBATE
Let us take some pieces of NDP rubbish from the debate on the Estimates and the Bill:
- Shevern John: “It is better to take the $41 million earmarked for the housing and give it to the teachers and civil servants who did not take the vaccine.”
- St. Clair Leacock: “The ULP government prays for natural disasters so that it can help people.”
- Israel Bruce: “You talk about education but you can’t build roads on education.”
- Daniel Cummings: “Like the NDP in the past, our NDP housing policy is to tell people to go on government land and build what you want, however you want.”
- Lorraine Friday and Daniel Cummings: “Why rush to build the houses before elections; let the people who ain’t get their houses fix yet, do without homes for a few more months until the NDP win the elections.”
And so on, the NDP rubbish piled up. The stench from their garbage offended the vast majority of Vincentians.
MEANWHILE THE ULP’S WORK CONTINUES
In the area of governance, the ULP is continuing to pursue all of its initiatives. We were elected for a fifth consecutive 5-year term on November 5, 2020; and Parliament first met after the 2020 elections on November 30, 2020; so, the five years run from that latter date, plus a further 90 days extra if we want to take them. Every day that the ULP is in government we do work. The NDP does not grasp this. And the NDP leader is silly, weak, lazy, and indecisive; he is a complete waste of time.
On the political front, the ULP is ramping up its activities. Last weekend at Colonarie and Diamonds Village, the candidate selection process respectively endorsed the Comrade again as the ULP’s candidate for North Central Windward, and Saboto again for South Central Windward. Stay tuned for the mother of all campaigns by the ULP for elections 2025!
