Premier Alex Scott has moved swiftly to play down potential speculation that Bermuda might be heading to the polls as early as this summer.

Speaking during an unscheduled appearance at a Progressive Labour Party meeting in West Pembroke on Monday night, Mr. Scott ended a defiant, campaign trail-style speech with the comments: ?If some of you think we are preparing for an election, you might be right.?

This raised the possibility that Government ? past half-way through a five-year term in office ? might soon be planning to call a snap vote in a bid to catch the new United Bermuda Party opposition leadership off-guard.

But the Premier yesterday warned people not to read too much into his comments at Monday?s community forum, attended by a string of Government Ministers, MPs and Senators.

He told : ?We have passed the half-way mark of a five-year term, and it follows that one should start thinking in these terms ? with no more special point being made than that.?

The statement added: ?The PLP party and Government have a sharpened focus on the to-dos that remain to be completed before we go back to the electorate. So Monday night?s comment was a re-statement of the obvious and a timely reminder that we ? the Government and the party membership ? should continue to be ever-aware of the electoral calendar.

?We do that regularly in-house at our Central Committee meetings and I re-iterated this in our community meeting,? Mr. Scott added.

With the question of when and how the independence issue might be tackled still up in the air, Mr. Scott also told the meeting that a campaign would be starting to talk ?seriously? about the controversial subject.

The Premier did not rule out the possibility of an election this year in his statement, however, PLP members yesterday suggested the chances of this happening were unlikely.

Senator Walter Roban, chairman of the PLP selection committee, said he had received no indication an election was on the immediate agenda.

He added that Mr. Scott was ?definitely not? indicating there will be an election soon, and suggested that the comments were probably ?slightly tongue in cheek? and aimed at making sure people were ?on the ball?.

?The Premier was just saying that every political party is in election mode from the day the previous election has ended,? Mr. Roban explained. ?Perhaps the only thing that can be read into it is that the Premier understands that the Government must always communicate effectively to the electorate, so they are clear on what we are doing. We will continue to do that as if the election was tomorrow.?

Deputy Premier Ewart Brown said: ?I believe the Premier says that we should always be prepared for an election. That?s fine with me.?

Asked if Bermuda could face a summer at the ballot box, he replied: ?I don?t know. You will have to ask the Premier.?

Sports Minister Dale Butler, asked the same question, said: ?I do not know and cannot tell. I have received no such instructions and it is not being discussed. So you will have to ask the Premier.

PLP backbencher Renee Web said she had not heard about any impending election. She said fall votes were more common in Bermuda but added: ?Any sensible political party would always be in election mode.?

United Bermuda Party leader Wayne Furbert said ?any leader worth his salt? should be considering election options three years into a term of office.

And he said that the power to decide the election date should not just rest with the Premier and raised the prospect of fixed election dates under a UBP regime.

The UBP?s Jamahl Simmons said the Opposition was ready for the next election ? whenever it was called.

He said speculation surrounding the date was unhelpful for voters and also backed his party?s idea of having a fixed election date every five years, so everybody got chance to have their say.

The ultimate decision on the election, though, rests with the Premier ? and even he might not update his Cabinet on the election date until moments before informing the press and public.understands that was the case before the last election in summer 2003, when former Premier Jennifer Smith caught voters, and some of her own party off-guard, and decided to go to the nation.

?Last time the Cabinet was told just before the public. It was a case of ?by the way, I?m calling an election?,? said a former Minister, who was off the Island when that announcement was made.