Senator Farley takes leadership of the Upper House

Senator Reginald Farley is officially the new President of the Senate.

In a sitting yesterday morning that launched his tenure as President of the Upper Chamber of the House of Assembly, Farley was nominated by Senator Dr. Jerome Walcott, the Minister of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade and seconded by Opposition Senator Caswell Franklyn before being unanimously elected to the position by fellow senators.

Like most events since March 2020, when the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) was declared a pandemic by the World Health Organisation, the sitting was moved to the more spacious convention setting of the Lloyd Erskine Sandiford Centre, Two Mile Hill, St Michael to accommodate social distancing and other
COVID-19 protocols.

The special Senate sitting was the forerunner to the main event, which was the two-hour long Thorne Speech delivered by Governor General Dame Sandra Mason, in which she outlined a number of planned initiatives of the Mia Mottley administration. It was her second Thorne Speech since the Mia Mottley administration was elected to office in 2018.

Senator Farley, who up to earlier this month served as the island’s High Commissioner to the Canadian capital of Ottawa, is a 59-year-old Certified Management Accountant. He holds an Economics and Management Degree from the Cave Hill Campus of the University of the West Indies and is a former executive director of the Barbados Chamber of Commerce & Industry and the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Barbados.

Before turning over the President’s chair to Farley during today’s sitting, Deputy President Senator Rudolph Greenidge warmly welcomed him back to the Upper Chamber, where he started in 1994 as a young Senator.

Responding to the welcome from his Senate colleagues, Farley said his last diplomatic posting in Canada was a fulfilling assignment but he was equally pleased
to be back home in Barbados and in the new leadership position in the Chamber.

In addition, the Senate President praised Barbados’ management of COVID-19 crisis including the testing process. He cited the fact that the results of his PCR COVID-19 test done in Canada took three days for the results to be returned, while the two tests he had undertaken in Barbados were back in 24 hours. This, he said, was testament to the quality of care and the hard work of public officers in the Ministry of Health and related departments.

Senator Farley replaces attorney, Sir Richard Cheltenham QC, who retired from the post.

Parliament Buildings in Bridgetown are still undergoing environmental cleaning and upgrading, and sittings have been shifted to Worthing Corporate Centre in Christ Church in the meantime.  (IMC1)