Government MPs were under no orders to vote along party lines during Friday’s session of Parliament which saw a One Bermuda Alliance MP controversially break with her colleagues and vote with the Opposition.

OBA whip Cole Simons confirmed yesterday that there had been no three-line whip in effect during the debate over a motion by the Progressive Labour Party’s Walton Brown.

With two OBA MPs off the Island, and Premier Michael Dunkley recused from the vote along with two others because of personal connections, the vote by St George’s South representative Suzann Roberts-Holshouser thus proved decisive.

When the ballot was called after five hours’ deliberation, she voted in support, to the apparent surprise of her fellow MPs — some of whom appeared to remonstrate with her as the House closed.

Mr Brown’s motion called for an independent commission of inquiry to look into widespread allegations of historic “land grabs” in which residents claimed they were cheated out of property.

According to Mr Simons, the Premier will make a statement on the motion’s success in due course.

Asked if the OBA had met over the weekend, Mr Dunkley said there hadn’t been a party discussion, but added: “As I do every weekend, and every day of the week, I’ve spoken to my colleagues on a number of issues.”

Mr Dunkley declined to comment when asked if Ms Roberts-Holshouser had given warning over her decision to vote along with the PLP.

“I’m not going to make any more comment on that matter,” he responded to further questions.

Although the debate centred on individual landowners who believed they’d been tricked out of their property rights, two significant compulsory purchases also dominated the discussion.

St George’s South, represented by Ms Roberts-Holshouser, encompasses the swathe of St David’s Island from which large numbers of residents were ordered to move, during the Second World War, to make way for the US-built airfield and military base.

More controversially, a large black Bermudian community was evicted from Tucker’s Town between 1920 and 1923, under a deal between the Bermuda Government and the Furness Withy cruise line, for a tourism development that ultimately became the Mid Ocean Club.

Attorney General Trevor Moniz argued that there was little point in revisiting these cases through a commission of inquiry, telling the House: “There’s nothing we can do about it — the laws permitted it and the parliamentarians made those decisions.”

Mr Brown’s motion came down to a vote shortly after 7pm when the OBA made a bid to remove references to victims of land grabs being entitled to compensation.

Finance Minister Bob Richards said the UK government wouldn’t hand out reparations — and that he would not “potentially commit the public purse”.

However, Speaker of the House Randolph Horton — who called it “one of the best debates I’ve had an opportunity to listen to” — ruled that the Premier, along with Minister of Education and Economic Development Grant Gibbons, had to recuse themselves as members of the Mid Ocean Club.

Mr Simons of the OBA, and PLP Deputy Leader Derrick Burgess, also had to abstain from voting as their families had been dispossessed under the Tucker’s Town deal.

As a St David’s Islander, Ms Roberts-Holshouser called for clarification, noting that her ancestors were affected by the base lands deal, but Mr Horton allowed her vote to stand.

In the alphabetical roll-call, Government MPs supported the amendment, and PLP MPs voted against. At this point, Ms Roberts-Holshouser dissented. With a vote of 15 to 13, the motion passed.

It was impossible to determine whether the Deputy Speaker’s subsequent confrontation with Tourism Minister Shawn Crockwell was caught by microphones in the House: for the second time in the current session of Parliament, the online recording of the debate was yesterday out of service.

As a visibly emotional Ms Roberts-Holshouser left the floor of the House, she was applauded by an outside supporter, and members of the PLP condemned the “verbal abuse”. She declined to comment when contacted last night by The Royal Gazette.

An OBA spokesman said the party would not issue a statement, and Mr Crockwell could not be reached by press time last night.

Asked why the issue of land cheats hadn’t been addressed during the PLP’s time in Government, Mr Brown said: “Logically, the outcome of that question is that one would question anything the PLP brings to Parliament now. Out of the MPs there for the PLP today, there are only two who were elected in 1998, so there’s been an entire change of people.

“Every term of Government or Opposition has different MPs, and so you see a different vision and different direction. For me, the question isn’t relevant.”