Assembly Tourism Minister David Dodwell commented on the ferry dispute, saying incidents like that soon got reported overseas.

He said it could harm the tourism industry and he hoped for a quick resolution, but he also challenged the PLP to say how they would deal with the issue.

And the spectre of the defunct Co-Op reared its head again, when Mr. Dodwell demanded to know what the PLP would do about that.

He said: "When there are 1,200 shareholders then I think the public has a right to know. What about the people who lost their jobs? These people are entitled to an answer.'' Michael Dunkley added his voice, saying that some former Co-Op workers discovered they didn't have any health insurance.

"The PLP and the BIU call themselves champions of social issues,'' he said.

"As soon as a sticky wicket comes into play they jump off it, they are not champions of peoples' causes or of social justice.'' But PLP MP Walter Lister admitted he didn't have the answers but said that there are businesses that close every year in Bermuda.

But he said the Government was making such a big deal out of it because the Co-Op members were predominently black.

"It is a real racial issue with the white members,'' he said. "They have insulted black people time and time again and I am tired of it.'' Mr. Dunkley retorted that he was not impugning improper motives by bringing up the issue of the Co-Op, and was not being racist.

Youth and Sports Minister John Barritt backed Mr. Dunkley: "He wasn't insulting anybody, it was simply that the PLP are silent. What we have been doing to the people who found themselves in these circumstances, is giving them our concerns for labour -- I don't think that is racial.'' Earlier Ottiwell Simmons claimed the way the Government was running the country was nothing short of ruining Bermuda's heritage.

He said new jobs coming to the Island were not benefitting Bermudians but the foreign labour that was brought in. "Every increase in the economy can not benefit anybody else but foreigners,'' he said.

"If that is the best you can do, providing employment for foreigners not Bermudians, what happens when it goes bad? The foreigners will have the cream and locals will be left to struggle with inflation and the rest of it.'' Mr. Simmons also questioned who would benefit from the PWs development on Pitts Bay Road, whilst during construction tourists were complaining about the noise and dust.

Finance Minister Grant Gibbons said there had been between 100 and 150 new jobs in construction for Bermudians, each year for the last two years.

He said it was vital to bring in foreign currency for the benefit of the economy and some of the money for the PW's site was coming from a partnership with Centre-Re.

House motions to adjourn He added there are now fewer non-Bermudians in the workplace than in 1988 -- a figure of around 6,500 in a labour force of 35,000.

Reginald Burrows said there should be better planning in the construction industry so gluts didn't happen.

He said all that happened when there was a construction boom, was that temporary housing was in short supply -- at a time when there were some families in desperate need of homes.

And he countered the Finance Minister's statement that there were fewer non-Bermudians in the workplace now: "The numbers are down, maybe so, but also hotels and guests houses are down from what they used to be -- things haven't changed that much,'' he said.