A debate in the House of Assembly on Friday night concluded with a fiery confrontation between Shadow Home Affairs Minister Maxwell Burgess and Premier Alex Scott.

The heated exchange began when Mr. Burgess addressed the House to report that challenges and difficulties had beset the Bermuda Homes for People project in St. David's.

“I ask today if Bermuda Land Development Company (BLDC) is still partners with Bermuda Homes for People (BHP),” Mr. Burgess asked.

Mr. Burgess also asked what the vetting process would be for those who entered last week's housing lottery. “Can someone confirm without any doubt that one or more of those that won a home that sold for $190,000 was not the owner of property in excess of $1 million?” he asked. “How were they allowed to enter the lottery?”

He wanted to know who chose the contestants. Next, he wondered how people could win homes that would not be completed by 2007, as promised.

“Government is selling false joy. This cannot be right. They still got people renting there,” he said. “When I look at the piece of property and see it still has tenants on it, the hope of those people getting on there by 2007 is not realistic.”

But when Premier Scott stood up to make a point of order, Mr. Burgess made a commented “if it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it must be a duck”.

The Premier objected, saying: “He just called me something I am not!”

“I said you're a duck,” Mr. Burgess replied, at which point he was made to sit down by Speaker Stanley Lowe.

Mr. Scott said all entrants to the housing lottery needed a certificate to prove they were first time home buyers from the Bermuda Housing Corporation (BHC) list of clients.

BLDC holds the land, BHP owns the intellectual property and BHC held the lottery, he said. He said BHP is still on board and BLDC had recently attended a meeting about the Harbourside project with himself and Housing Minister Ashfield DeVent.

“The process of getting money from the private sector is underway,” Mr. Scott said. “There is no aspect that suggests the project is in any form of danger.”

And he promised that the tenants on the Southside property will move. At the lottery last week, Mr. Scott said he saw white and black, married and single people who will all come together in a “mixed” housing development. “It is scandalous and scurrilous for the Member to play with people's dreams like that,” Mr. Scott said. “It's sad.”