The controversy over the outsourcing of the Bermuda Department of Tourism's New York office may well have left a good many people confused.

First, it needs to be stated that any moves to make Government more efficient and effective are to be welcomed.

On the other hand, the fundamental job of the Department of Tourism is to market and sell Bermuda, and the outsourcing of the North American sales office seems to suggest that it is unable to fulfil its basic mission.

The notion that an American group can sell Bermuda better than Bermudians also tends to stick in the craw.

It is even more surprising when it comes from a governing party that has always claimed to put Bermudians first.

Tourism Minister and Premier Dr. Ewart Brown has said that there are two reasons for the outsourcing.

One is that the Department has to make cuts having had its budget cut in February. The second is that Bermuda's sales model is "outdated".

Dr. Brown and his spokespeople have also said that the decision was "agonising", and it would be fair to take him at his word.

But there has not been a great deal of detail from Government either on just what it is that "Sales Focus", the outsourcing company that will take over the work, will do to develop a new sales model.

And in yesterday's Royal Gazette, former Department of Tourism official Kerry Judd trashed Dr. Brown's claims that the sales model for the North American sales office was 30 years old. In fact, under former Tourism Minister Renee Webb, a new sales model was introduced, to be followed by another under Dr. Brown himself.

That is not to say that the business of promoting and selling Bermuda has not changed. Even a decade ago, the primary drivers of tourism sales were travel agents. The advent of the Internet has changed that model dramatically and irrevocably. But no information has been forthcoming on how Sales Focus, which to be sure boasts a long list of Fortune 500 companies as clients, plans to do it. and one sector that is absent from their list is tourism, at least in any meaningful way.

There are a great many unanswered question about this. How was the company selected? Was it tendered? Who else was in the shortlist?

The public has been told that the Department of Tourism had to take this step after its budget was cut by $5 million in February. This is nonsense, as anyone who has been involved in budgeting will know.

No mention of outsourcing the North American Tourism office was made in the Budget Debate, suggesting the funding for the office was there. But the Ministry of Tourism's accounts are so opaque, that Dr. Brown may well have planned the cut then, but did not see fit to tell anyone.

What the public still does not know is just how much will be saved as a result of this outsourcing. The public does not know how much the current office costs to run, or how much Sales Force will be paid.

Of course, none of this takes into account the human cost of redundancies, or just what the employees will now do, assuming that they have been unable to secure work with Sales Focus.

But that has to be balanced against the financial results that may come.

To be sure, any Cabinet Minister must take hard decisions from time to time and needs to be certain that the public's money is being spent wisely and efficiently. Nor does this newspaper oppose outsourcing in principle.

But with so little to go on, it is impossible for the public to come to a reasoned decision on whether the cost to Bermudians, many of whom have dedicated their working lives to tourism, is worth it.