The United Bermuda Party will build a third pillar for the economy in the financial sector to help balance the reliance on international business, according to Shadow Finance Minister and Opposition Leader Grant Gibbons.

And if they get into power, they claim it will not only solidify the success of international business on the Island but also try to revive tourism to make sure there is employment in all sectors.

Dr. Gibbons said that one possibility of expanding the tourism base in Bermuda was looking at making the Island a destination for educational courses.

"Generally on the surface of it (the economy) things work reasonably well, but when you start to dig below the surface in Bermuda what you find over the last few years is there have been these enormous structural changes where our economy is extraordinarily dependent on international business," he said.

"And what we have realised in Bermuda for a long time now is that you have got to have a strong economy in order to be able to address a number of challenges that we have been talking about in this election - housing, healthcare for seniors and certainly education.

"Education is very expensive but also very important both from an economic perspective but also from an opportunity perspective,"

He said the country needed more police officers and said "the list goes on".

"So we start from the premise that in order to be able to pay for and in order to to be able to ensure that our quality of life improves, we need to have a strong underlying economy and that is the basic issue," he said. Dr. Gibbons said that since the Progressive Labour Party came into power there were fewer jobs for Bermudians, with higher demand for high-end white collar workers, but less for ordinary workers - which was causing problems.

And he said his party had a proven track record when it came to the economy and if they are elected have a whole host of measures to improve the lot of Bermudians and grow the economy.

The UBP in its platform said that the key to Bermuda's future economic prosperity lies in diversifying the country's economic base and that the Island's future social well being depended on ensuring that all Bermudians can share in the Island's prosperity.

One of the issues it says it will tackle head on is by creating a ministry separate from the Ministry of Finance that will deal with tourism and economic development.

The new Ministry of Economic Development they have planned is slated to developing strategies that it hopes will position Bermuda as a "compelling centre for business and investment.

It also proposes an Office of Economic Empowerment which will offer venture capital to Bermudian small businesses with plans to start-up "particularly for those who have been left out an left behind".

The UBP is to look for geographic diversity - wanting to use the whole of the Island and not just Hamilton as a business centre.

And it considers promoting Bermuda for off-site continuing education as one of the key ways to revitalise the economy by giving Bermuda a cash injection from mature and wealth "students" who come to Bermuda to learn.

"It is an ideal way for Bermuda to bring more tourists to the Island in a way similar to the way that Bermuda as a conference destination has been promoted by some hotels," said Dr. Gibbons. He said that many of the hotels were perfectly suited for this kind of educational tourism with some hotels already having large conference halls.

And Dr. Gibbons said it was key to work on education for Bermuda's children to make sure that every Bermudian got the best chance he or she could through the system.

Dr. Gibbons said: "When you start to look at the structural changes in our economy, it has changed dramatically and particularly in the last five years, in fact even before that.

"In 1995 tourism and international business contributed roughly the same amount to our economy, but if you look at 2001, tourism and international business, the ratio is now about three to one. International business is now contributing about three times to the economy that tourism is.

"What that means is that essentially we are now much more dependent on international business, but it has also changed the underlying job and opportunity structure in the economy, too."

He said if you looked at the job situation what you find between 1999 to 2002 there has been an overall loss of jobs but he said that the PLP was claiming they have created 2,400 jobs.

"In fact when you look at the numbers, it is an artefact, a different way of measuring between 1998 and 1999 - and that is stated in the economic review - but if you look from 1999 to 2002, what you find is there was a loss of 1,000 Bermudian jobs and a gain of 771 non-Bermudian jobs.

"So what we are seeing is the underlying structure changing and the job market is changing as well. And what we are really seeing here is with an increasing dependence on international business the nature of the jobs in Bermuda are changing."

When asked if this was a good or bad thing, Dr. Gibbons said: "It is not good. My whole point is we actively need to broaden and diversify our economy because we are increasingly dependent, especially in the last five years, in international business.

"And the point I am making is not everybody wants to work in international business, not everybody is suited to working in international business and in order to be able to provide the kinds of opportunities and the range of economic opportunities for small businesses and everybody else, you need to have a much broader and diverse economy."