Government Senator LaVerne Furbert says there’s “nothing new about poverty” as she was a single mom forced to put her children’s needs before her own.Sen Furbert used her own personal struggle of bringing up two sons to support her argument that “poverty isn’t increasing, it’s always been here”.The Junior Minister for Health and Public Works gave a lengthy speech in the Senate saying Bermuda was the third richest country in the world and she found it hard to believe that “this standard has changed”.Sen Furbert was the first senator to respond to Sen Kathy Michelmore’s motion to discuss solutions to the increasing problem of poverty in Bermuda.Sen Michelmore gave a detailed speech about poverty and praised the “very moving” film ‘Poverty in Paradise: The Price We Pay’, commissioned by the Coalition for the Protection of Children.But Sen Furbert rubbished her claims about poverty saying: “I don’t think we need to watch a film to see what we already know.”Sen Furbert said as a single mom raising two sons, she could have easily become “one of the [poverty] statistics”.She said: “I don’t think I ever considered myself to be poor, but there were things I couldn’t do because of my single status.“I thought it was more important to provide for my two sons than to provide for myself. I made sure they were educated, had a roof over their head and food in their stomach.“I went without a lot, I had no problems doing that and I don’t regret it one little bit.”At one point Sen Furbert asked: “We’re poor compared to what?” She said that as a single mom she may have been poorer than her next-door neighbour but she added: “I don’t begrudge them for that.”Sen Furbert said she knew how it felt to have your electricity, phone and cable disconnected. She said she also knew what it was like to go into the grocery store with only hope rather than money.She said: “I know what it’s like, I have been there, I have done that. I am grateful today that I no longer have to live like that. My sons are now adults and I don’t think I’ll have my lights disconnected by Belco.”Sen Furbert said that she’d never been on a cruise and had never really been on vacation as she tended to only travel for special events such as her sons’ graduations.She added that she was “reaching a milestone in her life” and asked if anyone would like to buy her a ticket to go on a cruise.Sen Furbert also spoke about when she was a child growing up in Flatts Hill and most families lived “hand to mouth” and “a pay cheque away from poverty”.The rich will get richer and the poor will get poorer, she said, adding: “But now all of a sudden we’re looking at poverty in Bermuda. Why?”She said the issue had been discussed in previous PLP platform speeches, dating back to 1968.“This is nothing new. There really is no increasing problem of poverty in Bermuda. Poverty has always existed and people have always looked at solutions.“There is a problem, but I don’t think it’s increased.”Sen Furbert said there was “a tendency by some in our community to highlight poverty” but Bermuda was suffering no more now compared to the past.She said: “This is not so. The PLP from its inception has recognised that people in the community are less fortunate than others.“There are some in our community who would have us believe that poverty became a problem in Bermuda when the PLP came into power and that no one is looking at ways to eradicate the problem. The poor will never be eradicated. The poor will always be with us.”Sen Furbert said a study should instead be commissioned to count how many flat-screen TVs each household had as her grandchildren “not only have their own rooms but also their own TVs and computers”.She said 90 percent of homes in Bermuda owned a computer and 95 percent owned cellphones, adding: “That’s not a country suffering from poverty.”Halfway through her lengthy speech Sen Furbert said she “may be boring some people” but she was going to keep on going.She then jumped back and forth about her trip to Grenada last week for the Conference of the Caribbean, Americas and Atlantic Region of the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association.At one point she commented how she was “absolutely amazed” that she saw so many clothes hanging on washing lines in Grenada.She said: “Most Bermudians own washers and dryers, if not they go to laundromats, you don’t even see washing lines here anymore.”Grenada had a 35 percent unemployment level, but there was no gang violence and had only been one murder there this year, she said. Sen Furbert said this proved that an increase in crime wasn’t related to poverty, adding: “I consider the Mafia to be a gang, but the reason they’re shooting isn’t because they are poor.”Coalition chairwoman Sheelagh Cooper was in the Senate’s public gallery listening to the debate on poverty.She said: “The issue of poverty and the plight of struggling families is far too important to be politicised and unfortunately that is precisely what Senator Furbert attempted to do.“Senator Michelmore took great pains in her presentation to keep the discourse on an A-political level being careful not to lay blame or suggest mismanagement but to put forward positive suggestions.“Senator Furbert’s response to Senator Michelmore was a rambling and mostly irrelevant discussion ranging from suggesting that someone give her a ticket to take a cruise to comments clearly reflecting that she believes Bermudians are better off today than they were ten or 15 years ago.”Mrs Cooper added: “It will be difficult to move forward if Senator Furbert’s view is reflective of her colleagues within the PLP. I would like to believe that this is not the case.”