Prescod criticises community development officers

Member of Parliament for St Michael East Trevor Prescod had some harsh words for some of the employees of the Community Development Department, accusing them of being uncooperative.

But newly appointed Minister of Community Empowerment Charles Griffith took umbrage at his comments, and defended the workers during Thursday evening’s session of the Estimates debate.

Prescod, who served as Minister of Social Transformation during the Owen Arthur administration, had called for the Community Development Department to be decentralised.

“One of the problems with it is that there are too many ‘Popes’ in there who feel that they can talk down to Ministers, and believe in sticking to old practices all the time. We have some community practitioners who are active on the ground in the various districts in Barbados, but the officers within the Ministry sometimes do not give them the help they need,” he said, adding that he hoped the report on the People’s Assemblies would address such matters.

Minister Griffith was not pleased with Prescod’s remarks.

“For the last three hours, people have heard what this Ministry has been doing, and it is unfortunate that this Member can now come in with this type of language and to say officers are talking foolishness,” he said.

“Yes, I understand there are some challenges, but there is a way to go about dealing with them and we must be given a chance to do so.”

Meanwhile, Coordinator of the Community Technology Programme, which falls under the Ministry of Community Empowerment, Bridget Marshall-Griffith said there had been a significant surge in interest in that particular programme during the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Initially, going into the pandemic, we thought that interest would have fallen off but we were proved wrong. We now have over 8,000 people registered, including some from other parts of the Caribbean and as far away as Africa. We have also introduced new courses like QuickBooks, office administration and webpage design, and in the future we will also offer computer, tablet and smartphone repair, coding and robotics, among others. We are also expanding the number of centres hosting the programme when we roll out our new courses starting between April and May this year,” she said.

Also speaking in Thursday’s session, Director of Youth Affairs Cleviston Hunte said Government will roll out a new National Youth Policy before the end of the year.

“We have engaged consultants from UNICEF and have been holding discussions with young people and other stakeholders all across the country as we try to shape this policy. We have just completed the edit of the second draft and we hope to have the updated draft ready by March 12,” he said. “We are holding a youth forum in April and then when everything is finalised, it will go to Cabinet and we plan to have it in place by June this year.” (DH)