Opposition Leader Grant Gibbons called the BHC scandal ?the darkest period of any Bermuda Government?s history?.

He called it a tragedy that no one in Government was taking accountability.

?The wicked UBP is not smearing BHC,? he said. ?Nothing can be further from the truth. I want to hear this Government stand up and be accountable for their behaviour!?

He said he found it striking that Government was not holding Tourism and Transport Minister Ewart Brown accountable for ?unethical behaviour?.

?The bigger challenge is affordable housing on the PLP watch,? he said. ?BHC was totally corrupt. There was a management meltdown.?

In a point of order, Premier Scott said the Police Commissioner and former Director of Public Prosecutions Kulandra Ratneser had retracted their comments of ?unethical? dealings at BHC. ?No one in Cabinet or in this House has taken any political hit for any of this,? Dr. Gibbons said.

He said the taxpayer had to pay for BHC?s bad debts. No Ministers were questioned by Police, he added. said: ?What has Government done to try rectify some of the money that has been spent ? $800,000 for a paint job. What has Government done to make restitution for those hurt by BHC during this debacle??

She said Nelson Bascome, who was the Minister responsible at the time, had not been held accountable for what had happened under this watch although housing was then removed from his portfolio.

?If that wasn?t punishment it means the Government condoned the minister.?

She continued: ?There was some real impact to some real people.?

Ms Gordon-Pamplin recounted the tale of a woman asked for $200,000 for renovation work even thought the contract said $140,000.

The work was shoddy even when attempts were made to fix it the result was poor.

?Rooms were not square, rooms were built inside other rooms, there was no ventilation.?

Some were using BHC as their own personal banking institution with illegal loans to help pay divorces, tuition fees and to pay off other debts.complained that parliament had been denied debating the 2002 report into BHC until three years later and suggested Government had waited until it could say things were fixed.

?Serious questions need to be asked and should have been answered before now ? how much money was lost.?

He derided Government MP Walter Lister who had regaled the House with his experiences of house building where not all contractors were honest.

Mr. Barritt said it wasn?t good enough to chalk it up to experience. ?That?s fine if it?s your money, not fine with money that belongs to the people of the country whose money you are entrusted to look after.?

Eight million dollars had been written off with nothing said by the Government, said Mr. Barritt.

He said the PLP were keen on dragging up history but if the lessons were not learned from the BHC debacle then the mistakes would be repeated ? and were already being repeated in the new school being built on Berkeley Hill.

The problems at BHC were not isolated incidences said Mr. Barritt but widespread. He quoted a project priced at $390,000 which cost nearly twice that.

?This is just a sample. Who?s paying the price? The taxpayer. I have not heard anyone on that side say they are going to dig into their own pockets.?

There were many cases of undetected duplicate payments said Mr. Barritt ? including one of $32,000 and two of $10,000.

He reminded MPs about how the Auditor General had begun investigating BHC even before UBP MP Michael Dunkley had lifted the lid on the scandal on the floor of the House.

Mr. Bascome ? making a point-of-order ? said that people put in by him were rooting out corruption.

Of Government?s promise that things were better now Mr. Barritt said: ?There were things in place before, why should people believe you now??

Mr. Barritt said Police files confirmed what the auditor had hinted at ? that there were kickbacks for corporation officials.

He expressed surprise that the Premier had not dealt with allegations of self dealing.

Despite the mess only one person was being charged said Mr. Barritt.

?We haven?t even got the Shaggy defence here ? it wasn?t me. It?s almost like it was anybody who did it.? said the debate had so far just been about politics.

He said the Auditor?s report indulged in speculation which could have resulted in fraud.

?Houses were built on this watch,? he said. What was most important was that BHC had followed all of the Auditor?s recommendations. chastised Government for taking three years to table the motion. ?We can?t change what happened but we can?t deny or trivialise what happened, because it affects people,? he said. ?Look at the examples being set to young people?. quoted the Premier to say ?you can?t prove anyone stole anything ? no one was charged?.

He said MP?s had to pass ?the higher test? because what they do ripples down into the community. ?This has got to be on record as the darkest day in Governance,? he said.

Government should compensate the people who had to spend too much money on their homes.

And it was not a matter of whether BHC had protocols, but whether they followed them, he said.

?In one case work quoted as $390,000 eventually cost $740,000, he said. ?They were almost doing as well up there as drug dealers.?

He questioned whether anything had been learned by Government considering no legislation had followed bringing in more accountability.

The report had spoken of Ministers having property handled by BHC. Mr. Burgess said there was nothing wrong with this as long as it was above board.

?We have to live by the rules we ask the public to live by.?

Nelson Bascome praised Opposition MP Michael Dunkley for raising the BHC scandal in the House in 2002, even though relations between the two had taken a turn for the worse over the issue and he had initially disbelieved the claims.

He said Mr. Dunkley had no documents at that stage and Mr. Bascome had then countered it after consulting with General Manager Raymonde Dill who had told him all was well.

Two days later the full weight of the scandal was revealed in the Mid Ocean News but Mr. Bascome told the House the revelations came as a shock to him.

?It shocked Bermuda and it shocked myself. I had gone into work convinced all was well.?

He said a break-in at BHC while Mr. Dill was away had Police puzzled but had led to the information coming to light. That prompted Opposition leader Grant Gibbons to say: ?Are you suggesting Dunkley broke in and stole the information??

To which Mr. Bascome said: ?I am not suggesting that at all.?

He suggested someone knew about the information and was able to get it to Mr. Dunkley. ?The buck did stop at my desk, there was corruption in my ministry.?

But he said information did not always flow up to ministers ? as had been pointed out by a report on Bermuda?s quangos.

He said the Auditor General had given BHC a clean bill of health in 2001. ?As the minister I had the head of the Corporation saying every is fine, I had the Auditor General saying everything is fine.?

As BHC embarked on an aggressive housing programme there were a number of contractors who wanted a piece of the action ? some were black companies who had previously been shut out who realised there was quick money to be made.

?Some were greedy, some have been identified and some are still being chased by the courts for legal action.?

He said the scandal shut down the building programme for about two years. Some contractors were unfairly tainted in the fallout of the scandal said Mr. Bascome who also defended his own reputation.

He said the only thing he had stolen in his life was a motorcycle in his teenage years while rumours of him building a mansion in Hamilton Parish were exaggerated. He said he was developing a small section of land ? most of which his family had donated to Francis Patton school.

Turning back to BHC he said: ?Two men were fired, there?s no fall guy. There?s some very real persons who had a responsibility to carry out, persons put in and trusted to do a job. When you read this report if you honestly believe these individuals were going a job then you can hire them in your business.?

He said some of the activities going on at BHC were ?unbelievable?. Of those responsible he said a ?veil of greed had consumed them?. But he also hit out at the General Manager before Mr. Dill ? Ed Cowen had been removed because the was not getting on with BHC building projects but still found time to work on his own projects.

Responding to criticisms by Patricia Gordon-Pamplin Mr. Bascome said the CEOs of companies were not expected to resign if their employees are caught doing illegal things.

He said: ?I am happy the Premier has decided to table this report and talk about it ? it releases me from a long period.?

Opposition MPs Wayne Furbert and Jon Brunson both shook Mr. Bascome?s hand after his speech.reeled off the new procedures Government had in place to ensure bids were carefully monitored and he said the allegations had a racial undercurrent. This prompted Mr. Furbert to say: ?He is misleading the House. Every time something comes out they always go to the racial tack.?

However Mr. DeVent repeated his claim that it was what he felt which prompted Grant Gibbons to question what it had to do with the BHC report.

Mr. DeVent said the much of the $8 million written off by BHC had gone to help people who had been the victims of shoddy work by BHC contractors.

He said it was time to bury the BHC issue and move on. said Government kept making the same mistakes and was doing the same with Berkeley. He said Government was too trusting. agreed the report had raised some shocking issues and he said he had seen first hand the examples of poor workmanship by BHC contractors in his own constituency with windows placed at a crazy angle.

He said he had written to BHC but was eventually told a number of contractors who said they had experience were being tried out but were proving to be disappointing.

Mr. Butler said he too had felt the pressure of PLP supporters who felt they were owed work.

He also spoke about the difficulties of part-time Ministers managing departments and being held responsible while being told they couldn?t micromanage.

After recently becoming aware of people in his department have Government credit cards he asked for names but was ignored and had to push for three month summaries of what was being spent. ?If you don?t do that, you will get caught out.?

He said the people running BHC were clearly the ones to be held accountable.