MP warns against sacrificing community for tourism at Holetown

Member of Parliament for St James Central Kerrie Symmonds has warned that community livelihoods and public access must not be sacrificed in the name of tourism development at Holetown, St James.

Speaking at the St James Ideas Forum town hall meeting at Frederick Smith Secondary School on Wednesday night, Symmonds said he could no longer keep silent on the issue, given longstanding concerns about dwindling west coast beach access for locals and the proposed redevelopment of the civic centre site.

“I felt a duty to, because up to this point I have publicly kept my lips pursed,” Symmonds told constituents. “One cannot be seen to be in Cabinet, let alone carry the designation, senior member of the Cabinet, and be publicly parting company with the Cabinet of which you are part. So, obviously, a lot of talking and negotiating has to go on behind closed doors.”

Symmonds, who is also Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade Minister, stressed that while investment was important, projects must allow coexistence with the surrounding community.

“We have to find a way of getting a coexistence of the Barbadian community with the investment effort. One cannot alienate or exclude the other,” he said.

“And where that has happened in the Caribbean, and we can point to places like Jamaica, for example, you get an us-versus-them kind of thing, and that has never been what Barbados is about. It breeds a level of discomfort, disquiet, perhaps even sometimes hostility. And again, that is not what Barbados is.”