Premier Ewart Brown has promised that all contracts awarded by Cabinet will be published in the Official Gazette from next month.

Dr. Brown called the move which comes as The Royal Gazette celebrates Sunshine Week a "progressive step on transparency" but it was swiftly denounced as "futile" by Shadow Works and Engineering Minister Patricia Gordon-Pamplin.

She said it was "tantamount to closing the stable door after the horse has already bolted", adding: "If you have got to open up the process before you give the contract, then that's transparency."

The Premier told the House of Assembly yesterday that a notice listing all contracts awarded, the name of the contractors, the services to be provided, the amount of the contracts and the Ministries providing funding, would appear at the end of each calendar month.

The notice will also indicate if the contract was awarded after a full tender procedure or on a "sole source basis".

He said the new policy was prompted by "all manner of aspersions" being cast on the awarding of state contracts and was to "further ensure openness and transparency in government".

Dr. Brown added: "This Government has nothing to hide and is quite content to take this progressive step in the name of assuring public confidence in the processes applied every day in securing service providers to deliver on the things promised to our people."

His remarks appear to suggest the Premier has been paying close attention to The Royal Gazette's call for Bermuda to celebrate Sunshine Week — an initiative aimed at opening up dialogue on transparency and in keeping with our A Right To Know: Giving People Power campaign for freedom of information.

But Mrs. Gordon-Pamplin suggested that his announcement really amounted to "nothing", describing the decision as "a very small step that is lacking in substance".

She added: "The gazetting of a process that is a fait accompli — [i.e.] the decision would already have been made — doesn't offer much to the tender process or the appearance of fairness."

Controversy has surrounded the awarding of big government contracts in recent years, including for the $78 million new Police and court building and the massively over-budget Berkeley Institute project.

The Premier told MPs yesterday: "For some time, we have been treated to all manner of aspersions cast against this Government regarding the award of contracts for goods and services.

"Even when met with the truth and clear facts there are those who simply will not be swayed in their determined efforts to paint every contract award with the brush of suspicion."

Government promised last month that it would create a website where companies could bid for Works and Engineering (W&E) contracts on an "equal" footing.

Works and Engineering Permanent Secretary Robert Horton said all new W&E sponsored projects had to go through a tendering process and the website would promote "greater transparency".

Mrs. Gordon-Pamplin said yesterday: "If the Premier had announced that the Government will open the tendering process in accordance with their online bidding policy, and had committed to the entire procedure being transparent before the awarding of such contracts, then contractors who now feel it futile to bother to bid might have more hope that their bids will be fairly considered."

She said the entire tendering process needed to go online, with the public able to scrutinise the contenders once bidding for a contract had closed. She suggested the Island follow a tried-and-tested system, such as the one used in Australia.

The Premier was not the only PLP politician talking about Sunshine Week yesterday. Party chairman David Burt posted a blog on the topic on the PLP's website, including a list of questions he came up with for what he described as "public officials and institutions".

His queries included several to The Royal Gazette, which is owned by a publicly quoted company on the Bermuda Stock Exchange. It is not part of government or funded through taxation; a freedom of information law would be limited to publicly funded bodies.

Mr. Burt said: "Most certainly it is an institution — it's the daily newspaper."