State aid reserved for most vulnerable this hurricane season

Government will no longer rescue property owners who can afford insurance but fail to protect their assets against natural disasters, a Cabinet minister has announced. 

The warning comes as officials launch preparations for the 2025 Atlantic hurricane season, which starts on Sunday, with ministers emphasising that state support will be reserved for the most vulnerable.

Minister of Home Affairs and Information Wilfred Abrahams warned: “Bailouts of the scale in Elsa and Beryl are unlikely to ever happen again. The government just cannot afford to do that again. Persons who can afford it must insure their assets, especially if that asset is how you earn your living. To not do so, you risk all at your own peril.”

Apologising for the timing of the announcement, Abrahams told a press conference to launch the season on Friday at the Department of Emergency Management (DEM) in Warrens that the government can no longer afford to bail out people who have the means to insure their properties.

“Barbadians as a whole appear not to want to insure their properties, and there will be some who, because of their financial position, are not in a position to do it,” Abrahams said. “So, the government will always have to accommodate and look out for those persons in the case of a disaster.

“But for all the persons who have the capacity to insure their properties, I urge you: insure your properties. Following Beryl, about 95 per cent of all the boats impacted by the storm surge associated with Beryl were uninsured. Ninety-five per cent.”

He recalled that after Hurricane Elsa hit Barbados on July 2, 2021, the government embarked on perhaps the single largest social rescue programme in the administration, undertaking to repair and rebuild damaged and destroyed homes.

Abrahams explained: “Most of the affected housing stock was not insured. We are still reeling from the devastation and the cost of Elsa. The government did it at that time because there was no other option. It was not expected; we were caught by surprise, and the reality is, if the most vulnerable are affected, then the government has to step in to cover them and ensure that they can get back on their feet.”

He added: “It is perhaps one thing to not insure your house; but when you don’t insure your business, when you don’t insure your boat that you depend on to make money and to feed your family, then you are playing with your future in circumstances [storms] that are becoming increasingly more volatile, more powerful and more frequent. 

“I am sorry to adopt this tone, but it is important for people to know, we have one chance to get it right. It does not make sense crying after the event. You could have done something about it. I know personally that I have taken steps to secure my property in a way that I have never done before . . . because I looked at what happened to others, and I don’t want that to happen to me.”

He argued that for those who can afford to insure their properties, there is no excuse not to take responsibility for making their property or business as resilient as possible.

“I don’t want the message to be misunderstood. We accept there will always be vulnerable persons who cannot do it; and then the responsibility falls on government. But if you are in a financial position to do so and you fail to do so, that is now at you,” Abrahams warned.

Abrahams reported on the status of the housing repair and rebuilding programme, which the government undertook following Hurricane Elsa four years ago, pointing out that all the work has not been completed.

“The vast majority have been completed, but we have encountered some issues. The government cannot get into family business. So you have persons who are living in houses, and when the houses were destroyed, we attempted to repair or rebuild the houses, people came forward saying, ‘That is not his house, this is my house… I always wanted him out.’ So, there is dispute over title,” Abrahams explained.

“We cannot intervene in there. So, there are some persons who may be living in properties . . . the properties were damaged or destroyed and they are still now being supported by the government, because we have been unable to fix their properties due to circumstances, not necessarily within our control, but outside of our control. But I can tell you the vast majority of persons who were displaced during Elsa are back in accommodation.”

Abrahams told the news conference, which was also attended by the Director of the DEM, Kerry Hinds, and the Director of the Barbados Meteorological Services (BMS), Sabu Best, that the recovery effort was nothing short of phenomenal.

He also described it as a social intervention on a scale never before seen in Barbados, undertaken by any government. 

Meantime, Best put Barbados on high alert with a “dire” warning that storms are developing earlier every season, becoming increasingly more intense and powerful and getting closer to the island.

In a sobering prognosis for the hurricane season, he urged Barbadians to take the predictions of the local Met Office more seriously.

He said that above-average cyclones could affect the country this year with more rapid intensity and the evidence suggests the hurricanes will match the forecasts in terms of gravity and potential impact on the island.

Using visual diagrams on a large screen to illustrate the annual increase in the number of hurricanes, including major ones, the Met Office chief cautioned the country to pay serious attention to these developments.

Best used three line graphs to show the centres of tropical storms that passed within 150 kilometres of the island since record-taking started in 1855, a second of those that passed within 100 kilometres and the third within 50 kilometres. He said between 1995 and 2024 there had been an unprecedented uptick in major storms passing within 50 kilometres of Barbados.

“Folks, in summary, they are coming closer and closer,” he said. “Not just closer, but frequently. It’s a fact. The figures are here. They are coming closer.”

He noted that all of the weather agencies predict an above-average hurricane season for Barbados this year again. The BMS is predicting seven tropical storms, three of which should become hurricanes and one of which should become a major hurricane. 

emmanueljoseph@barbadostoday.bb