parties not to politicise certain areas of public policy. As an example, understanding that the United States should not send conflicting messages to the rest of the world, the Republicans and the Democrats joined in supporting US foreign policy for many years.

These areas are generally areas of national concern where there is recognition that political fighting is not in the national interest. There are, in any country, areas which should transcend vote-getting or political point-making because they are more important to the general populace than politics. The aim is not to stifle politics, but to act in the national interest.

This is not to say that there should be no political discussion or no varying opinions and it is certainly not to suggest that the party in power should receive policy support no matter what it does. It is to suggest that once programmes are in place, they should be supported publicly because, without general support, progress beneficial to the country will be hampered. There are a number of areas where this kind of support could only improve life in Bermuda. Drugs and alcohol are a very obvious example of an area of national concern which transcends politics because it affects everyone in Bermuda and where co-operation from political parties, and everyone else, would further progress.

Clearly AIDS is another area. We do not get full co-operation in the fight against AIDS because the churches are not in agreement with public policy and some politicians are very heavily influenced by the churches.

We think that a third area is the Police Service. Machinery should be put in place to prevent Police abuses and then the Police Service should be left alone to get on with a job which is critical to every person on the Island, Bermudian, resident guest or visitor.

Does Bermuda enjoy that kind of constructive co-operation? No. We think the no arises because some people simply cannot resist scoring political points, no matter what the cost to Bermuda. The current rows over restructuring the Police are firmly rooted in politics and will only result in a slower reorganisation and a weakened respect for the Police Service. There is a general public feeling in Bermuda that a restructuring was necessary to improve policing. The Police Service was some 30 years out of date and that showed in the crime rate and the crime solution rate.

Once there was broad agreement that restructuring was needed, there should have been general political support for the process since it was important to us all. We think that would have happened in many other countries because it is a question of public safety. It would have been recognised that it is extremely dangerous to undermine the Police. Support did not happen in Bermuda because politicians are too "hungry''.

Right now there are people in place to restructure the Police. There is an approved Bermuda Police Strategy for the changes which are being carried out.

There is every indication so far that what will result will be better policing of Bermuda. Better policing of Bermuda is something which everyone, especially the PLP, was crying out for. Yet we have constant political interference with the restructuring process.

Does that make good sense for Bermuda? We think not.