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Gordon-Pamplin: ?Something smells wrong?

Patricia Gordon Pamplin

Shadow Minister Patricia Gordon-Pamplin accused Government of having an incestuous relationship with the contractors of Berkeley.

As an example, Ms Gordon-Pamplin pointed to an arbitration hearing over a $20 million claim made against Government by Pro Active Management Services.

She said that the Lubben Group were arbitrators ? despite being Pro Active?s partners in the original bidding for the second senior school.

She said: ?Tell me there was a divorce between those (Pro Active and the Lubben Group) two companies.

?This Government with all of its contacts could not find an independent arbitrator.

?This says to me that something smells wrong.?

And while referring to the auditors? report she said that the tech officers had considered the Pro Active bid as high risk and recommended that they not get the contract.

?The Lubben Group had no experience working in Bermuda and they were a development company rather than a contractor,? she said.

?And they (Pro Active) had no experience in building a project so large.

?We need to leave it up to the experts and accept that we as ministers are in no way experts.

?If I need surgery I get a surgeon who is good with a scalpel and if I need a ditch dug I get someone who is good with a shovel, but I would not expect a ditch digger to be good with a scalpel.?

On the delays surrounding the project she said: ?If the contractor is not at fault than the Government is at fault.

?We have been dealing with moving targets, moving targets on completion dates and moving targets on costs.?

She called on Government to give some sort of guarantee to ensure that the costs of the school would not keep escalating.

She said: ?After all the encumbrances is it going to be able to support the payment of the bond?

?It (the bond) is a public document and should be filed with the Registrar.

?The document had not been filed and there should be free access to it.?

Ms Gordon-Pamplin said there was a need for the Government to spell out what it was planning to achieve.

She was speaking during the Budget debate yesterday and suggested the opening date of September 30, 2004 was incorrect and the school would instead open in 2005.

?It will take six months for the Department of Education to outfit the school, which would make it March 30,? she said.

?It should be around Easter break when the school will be ready and I cannot see any teachers moving students into a new school for the last term.

?But what you (the Government) is saying is that the students will be in the new school by September.

?Is that the day when you will get the keys ? or is it the day that students will be moving in to the school??

She reminded Government that it kicked up a storm when there was a two week delay on the opening of CedarBridge Academy.

She also said that her side of the House had not seen any audited accounts to do with the school project and she said: ?That?s what the public demands and they deserve to ? it is their right.?

Government Minister Derrick Burgess accused Ms Gordon-Pamplin of blowing the situation out of proportion and he said the increase was from $68 million to $88 million.

He said: ?There is no money gone missing ? no $700,000.?