A contentious exchange between Chairman of Committees in the House of Assembly Peter Phillips and Leader of the Opposition Ralph Thorne yesterday led to Minister of People Empowerment and Elder Care Kirk Humphrey being instructed not to answer a question.
Humphrey’s ministry and its budgetary allocations in the Estimates were under scrutiny on the third day of debate on the Appropriation Bill, 2025, when Thorne questioned Humphrey about whether $500 000 allocated to the Barbados Alliance to End Homelessness last year was being provided for it again this year.
“I want to remind the Honourable Member for St Michael South (Humphrey) that last year during this exercise, we were told that a particular organisation was paid $500 000 of the money belonging to the taxpayers of this country, and this year we have heard that that payment of $500 000 was in the nature, and I quote, ‘of an experiment’,” the Opposition Leader said.
“Now, however I feel about it, I believe that the public is due some deeper explanation as to the payment of this experiment, a rather expensive experiment paid to, for all intents and purposes, one individual.
“The public is entitled to know how much that entity . . . is being paid this year, or how much it is proposed to pay to that entity this year, having been paid $500 000 last year as an experiment.”
In posing the question, he suggested some of the money may have been improperly directed by someone connected with the organisation in question, whom he declined to name.
“I am asking this minister if he is aware that the beneficiary of those funds distributed hampers within certain neighbourhoods of St Michael, at certain homes during Christmas 2024. It was not the homeless; I said at certain homes,” Thorne said.
He said he was not telling Humphrey how to answer but it was a simple answer of “yes”, “no” or “I don’t know”.
“The public is entitled to an answer. The public is entitled to know whether
a man who got $500 000 of taxpayers’ money unaudited . . . whether the donor ministry is aware that he has been distributing hampers? Simple question, simple answer,” said an animated Thorne.
However, in repeated warnings to the Opposition Leader, the Chairman of Committees instructed him to “stick to the Estimates and the ministry”.
“What does this have to do with the Estimates?” Phillips asked.
Thorne persisted with the line of questioning nevertheless, prompting Humphrey to accuse the Christ Church South Member of Parliament of engaging in “cheap theatre”.
Addressing the chair, Humphrey said: “In a brief, quite fleeting moment of clarity, the Leader of the Opposition began his comments by saying that he was going to look at the numbers and the Estimates . . . . First of all, we gave no money to an individual, funds were given to an association.”
As Thorne continued to press Humphrey for answers, the Chairman of Committees told Humphrey: “Honourable Member, do not answer that question. It has nothing to do with these Estimates.”
After a few moments of another exchange, Thorne moved on to another question.
(GC)
