The poor quality of education in Bermuda has been blamed for standing in the way of the Island becoming a world centre for reinsurance and insurance markets. The claims were made by Don Watson, Director of Reinsurance at Standard and Poor's, while at Rendez-Vous de Septembre, an international reinsurance conference in Monte Carlo. Mr. Watson was speaking only days after his company, which is a global publisher of financial information and ratings, produced a report stating that Bermuda's size and a lack of infrastructure would stop the world's insurance and reinsurance companies moving en masse to Bermuda. Speaking about why businesses could be reluctant to relocate to the Island, Mr. Watson said that not only was there a probWlem with poor standards of employees in Bermuda, but people moving to the Island were concerned for the education of their children within Bermudian schools. He said: "From the anecdotal information I hear talking to companies, the largest concern is the educational system in Bermuda. "It cuts two ways. One is the inability to hire local individuals and having well trained and sophisticated employees that they can hire in Bermuda. "The second, and perhaps what hits home even more, is concern from external workers about where their own children attend school.'' In the report published by Standard and Poor's this week, Bermuda was put under the spotlight. It said the number of Bermuda-based companies would continue to grow through acquisition, but said that while companies could see the attraction of moving off-shore because of lower tax and less restrictive regulations, the lack of physical space and infrastructure would stop the entire industry moving to the Island. The report, called "Reinsurance, A Global Enterprise'', said: "Perhaps the biggest impediment to wholesale redomestication to these favoured climes is the lack of physical space and infrastructure needed to service the virtual headquarters of these global insurance operations.'' The report also singled out Bermuda for its success in attracting off-shore business, stating: "One does not need a crystal ball to predict further acquisitions by the Bermudians as they seek to flex their burgeoning capital base and acquire a global presence.'' Speaking to The Royal Gazette from Monte Carlo, Mr. Watson expanded on the meaning of the report. He said: "You do not have the employees on the Island to hire and bring in to the insurance roles -- underwriting, marketing and accounting and all those areas, so you have to entice people from off-island to come down to Bermuda. "And although it is a lovely island, the family issues such as what is my spouse going to do for the time that I'm down here and how will my children fare in the school system come up time and time again. And this makes it very difficult to attract workers of the quality needed.'' And Mr. Watson said that the only way to make the Island more attractive to potential companies was to embark on a long term restructuring of the education system which would need capital investment from the Government.

Education standards come under attack "I really believe if the Government has the commitment to build a first class education system, that this problem can be solved. It will take money and resources and that is the issue that the government has to deal with. Bermuda has a top notch base of people. They are very well spoken and many of them are well educated. But they need to get the specialised training to go another level above.'' Mr. Watson believes that Bermuda has already started to move towards acknowledging the problem with programmes such as the New York College of Insurance and the Bermudian internships sponsored by companies.

"But Bermuda needs more programmes of this nature. The Bermudians need to become interested in finding these exciting opportunities and there is some work that needs to be done on the part of the companies to tell them what these opportunities are what is insurance, what is underwriting and what is marketing for an insurance company.'' Mr. Watson believes that the only way forward for Bermuda is to invest in its people, before it can become part of the global market.

"It is a long term investment and something you have to try for ten year to have a result. I think the beginnings are there and efforts have to be made to more classes, larger classrooms and you can bring people in to train, bring people from the US or UK to train at least for a period of time until you are ready, as an Island, to take over the job yourself.'' Education Minister Milton Scott last night admitted that the education system in Bermuda needed to be improved and that the Government were working both on long and short term plans to improve the situation.

"We have an initiative at schools to enhance our literacy and to put our kids on the cutting edge of education.'' Mr. Scott said programmes such as the XL initiative should help young people after school.

"In fact what we are doing is unprecedented and a model for the rest of the world. It is a first rate initiative. We are not there yet but we are making some strides in the right direction.'' Mr. Scott added that he believed that Mr. Wilson's claims of lack of skilled workforce in Bermuda may be slightly overblown because of the excess demand for labour on the Island.