Watchdog body coming to oversee Gov’t projects

Barbadians are being told they can look forward to greater transparency when it comes to public sector projects.

Minister in the Ministry of Investment Marsha Caddle told an online forum that Government was in the process of planning the establishment of a “public investment dashboard” that would provide pertinent information relating to public sector investment projects including cost overruns, procurement procedures and company selection.

She said generally there was a “sensitivity” among the population that there was so much corruption when it came to public sector projects “so much so, that governments are at pains to prove an absence of corruption in their messages”.

“We are doing some work to establish a public investment dashboard. That is something my ministry manages – the Public Sector Investment Programme. There are often questions asked about certain public investment projects – how was the procurement done, who are the principals and so on. We think it is important that people see exactly what is the level of government expenditure, where is the financing coming from, where is it going, what are the reasons for the delays – because sometimes delays are real and there is something behind them that is not nefarious,” she said.

“So what we are doing is first trying to get all this information in place for those who manage the Public Sector Investment Programme to be able to clearly do our work and track progress. And then, once we have established that and it is reliable, we then share that with the public so that people can go and see, for major projects, what is the data behind them, what are the reasons behind the delays and how they are moving,” she explained.

This development forms part of Government’s ongoing $80 million public sector modernisation programme.

Caddle, who has responsibility for the Statistics Department, also stated that Government was also in the process of developing a new Statistics Act and establishing an independent statistics and data analytics authority.

“That independence is going to be important because it is going to mean there are certain direct reportings to the people and the Parliament of Barbados that was not in place before,” said Caddle.

She argued that in making data transparent and with a Freedom of Information Act to also be introduced, the data should be “very reliable, true and defendable”.

“So it is important that countries spend the time to invest in making sure that the data is good data. I have seen cases where we have these Freedom of Information Acts that don’t necessarily, because of the quality of the data, lead to better information,” she said.

Caddle was speaking on Wednesday during the Development Bank of Latin America (CAF) flagship report presentation 2019 entitled Integrity in Public Policy: Keys to Prevent Corruption.

She said corruption prevention required people speaking out when they witnessed corrupt practices. There is a role for the private sector in this, she said.

“It takes two hands to clap. We have to make sure that there are not just sanctions on the side of public officials, which we do bring in our public financial management legislation, but that we have a very clear understanding of the ways in which entrenched corruption can bring perceived benefits to individuals and to make sure those individuals are willing to give up those perceived benefits. It has to be a public discussion and it can’t just be led by government,” said Caddle.

She said the Mia Mottley administration was making it difficult for the private sector to engage in corrupt practices by increasing the fines under the legislation.

The highly-publicised Integrity in Public Life Bill was defeated in the Senate on August 5, 2020. The bill fell four votes short of the two-thirds majority (14 votes) required for it to be passed, after there was a walkout of four senators who had opposed the presence of Senator Lisa Cummins in the Upper Chamber at a time it was perceived she should have still been self isolating after being exposed to COVID-19. There were also two abstentions.

Under that law, fines range from as little as $10,000 to as much as $100,000 or jail time of six months or one year, depending on the offence.

Acknowledging the failure of the bill to pass the Upper House, Caddle said “There has to be a conversation to be had to make sure that there is broad-base acceptance. We are the government of the day and we have brought this legislation and there are opposing forces who are preventing it from going forward.

“There has to be a social compact. We have to all agree it is not just for Government to carry. The private sector has to be subject to the same sanctions as public officials. And individuals, quite frankly, have to be subject to the same sanctions as public officials and that is what we have done in much of our legislation,” said Caddle.