MPs came in for a tongue-lashing from Pembroke South East MP Ashfield Devent for their hypocritical, rowdy behaviour in the House of Assembly and failure to act as positive role models for the Island's young people yesterday.

After witnessing several verbal skirmishes in the House of Assembly during Friday night's motion to adjourn, he stood and said: "Some of the behaviour we display up here is not very different from some of the rowdiness young people display.

"Occasionally my son listens and says, 'You lot run the country? You lot?' And he's nine!

"Lots of things we say they shouldn't do, they say: 'But you guys do.'"

Another example of the hypocrisy was the double standard on marijuana and alcohol in Bermuda, he said. "They say, you're telling us not to smoke this spliff, when you're going home to drink a fifth!"

Several MPs throughout the evening had spoken on the need for artistic censorship to prevent incidents such as those which took place during the now-infamous Elephant Man concert at White Hill Field last week. However in reference to that idea Mr. Devent said: "You really want to see our young people act up?"

"Elephant Man is responsible for all the ills of this country?" he asked, adding that decades ago Elvis Presley also had been "the root of all evil". Preventing stars like Elephant Man from coming to Bermuda "is not the answer at all", he said.

"I'm beginning to wonder if we're all a bunch of Puritans," he continued.

He himself could remember when he first started listening to reggae, which at the time was unacceptable. Now, he pointed out, people with dreadlocks are MPs and Supreme Court justices. "We have to embrace people for what they are. Change is coming. We have to embrace that particularly if we want to save our young people.

"The fact is that young people embrace things we older folks don't necessarily understand or agree with. We need to understand them."

That involved not just hearing about concerts like the Elephant Man concert second-hand, but actually attending them to see first-hand what is going on with the Island's youth.

Bridging the age gap in that way would also give young people more positive role models, he said. "Young people are at these functions with no adults. How can they learn if we're not there to show them? Some of us might need to see what these concerts are about.

"In a lot of ways they are a lot smarter than we were. Anyone dealing directly with them knows that.

"Ten or 15 years from now young people will be sitting in these very same seats," he said.

Shadow Legislative Affairs Minister John Barritt rose immediately after Mr. Devent saying he wished to compliment the Government MP.

Mr. Barritt said Mr. Devent had used "an analytical and logical fashion of approach to a problem which is too big for the PLP or the UBP to deal with".

However he also noted that Mr. Devent had given MPs "the challenge of a lifetime" in his request for them to stand up. "It's a paradox," he said. "There does come a time where you have to say, 'Too much is too much.'

"Where we are selling young people short is that it never comes with an explanation, but always with an iron fist.

"Young people push the envelope but we cannot possibly embrace criminal activity. Some of (the incidents at White Hill Field) went too far, and we have to say that."