Reform blueprint earns praise at national ideas forum

A St George resident has set out an ambitious, integrated strategy for the island’s future, winning strong praise from attorney general Wilfred Abrahams at Monday’s Ideas Forum in the Glebe.

Addressing a panel that included the prime minister and cabinet ministers, Charles Brathwaite urged Barbadians to look beyond short-term fixes, arguing that systemic issues such as rising crime, traffic congestion and ageing infrastructure are interconnected and require integrated, long-term planning rather than isolated solutions.

To address these pressures, Brathwaite presented three policy proposals spanning penal reform, youth intervention and national infrastructure planning.

The first proposal centred on a major overhaul of the penal system, shifting the focus from punishment to workforce development. Brathwaite recommended establishing a national prison rehabilitation and public works programme, dividing male and female prison populations into 11 working groups, each assigned to a parish.

Operating under the supervision of prison officers and qualified technical personnel, these teams would receive certified training in road repairs and pothole maintenance, debushing, gully cleaning, drainage upkeep and landscaping.

Brathwaite emphasised that inmates should be paid for their labour, with earnings divided into four parts: a contribution to the National Insurance Scheme to maintain social security records, a weekly allowance for approved personal expenses, a compulsory savings account payable upon release to aid reintegration, and a contribution towards the cost of incarceration.

Asserting that “works create dignity, rehabilitation creates hope”, he suggested that the programme would lower government maintenance costs while equipping inmates with marketable skills to prevent recidivism.

The second recommendation focused on early intervention for young people, advocating the creation of three national youth development villages. Brathwaite warned that waiting until a young person turns 16 or enters the justice system is too late to alter entrenched behavioural patterns, arguing that intervention must begin at the primary school level through cooperation among teachers, guidance counsellors, parents and community organisers.

Under his framework, identified children would move through three developmental stages within these villages, covering literacy, numeracy, character education, teamwork and technical disciplines such as artificial intelligence, digital technology, agriculture, construction and entrepreneurship.

Brathwaite said: “The purpose is simple. We must stop investing primarily in prisons, increasing the police force, police stations, and strengthening laws and begin investing in children.” He added that “the measure of a nation’s success, I suggest, is not how many prisons it builds, but how many lives it successfully redirects before prison becomes a necessity.”

His final proposal addressed long-term national development, focusing on potential revenues from offshore oil and gas. Brathwaite warned against the historical tendency of countries to squander windfalls through poor planning:

“Countries that wait until revenue begins to flow often waste historic opportunities. Planning must begin now.”

He proposed the immediate creation of a full-time National Development Planning Committee to draft a comprehensive National Infrastructure Transformation Plan 2080. The plan would decentralise government ministries to ease urban congestion, protect agricultural land and design climate-resilient networks for public transport, water and electricity.

Responding directly, Abrahams commended the depth of the proposals. “I smiled when you did it because that was one of the most thorough presentations I’ve ever heard in an ideas forum. I like the way you thought it through and every single thing you thought you thought through, presented it in a way that was saleable, explained the rationale behind it, so even if we don’t agree with you, we can see a way to try to meet you halfway.”

But the attorney general then said the government was already pursuing similar initiatives, particularly in prison reform, noting that the prison service has modernised its agricultural programmes and is positioning itself as a major producer of poultry and pork, alongside establishing a substantial tilapia farm.

He also acknowledged legislative and practical challenges in implementing mandatory work programmes:

“We take the point entirely that the prison is not just where you go and send people to lost away, right? It’s not just to put somebody out of the way until such time as they served their sentence. We have to look at ensuring that people come out better than they went in.

“We have to change some legislation and do some other things because you can’t force a prisoner to work, right? The laws against that — that’s against….. slavery. So we have to create a circumstance that makes it attractive and incentivises the prisoners.”

He agreed with the need for financial support to aid reintegration, noting that many leave prison without basic resources such as clothing for interviews or a mobile phone.

“A lot of people come out of prison with nothing more than they went in with. They can’t get a cell phone, right? They can’t buy clothes to go and do an interview. And the first thing to do is go back to the circumstance that landed them in prison in the first place. We want to transition people from that.”

Pledging to facilitate discussions between Brathwaite, home affairs minister Gregory Nicholls and the superintendent of prisons, Abrahams said he was keen to explore how elements of the proposals could strengthen current government plans.

“I know the superintendent of prisons is always willing to engage persons on ideas for the betterment of the prison or for prisoners. So as I said, I’m gonna get your information from Roy, put you in, in contact with them., I’ll go with you as well because I really wanna hear the interaction and see if we can incorporate some of your ideas into what we’re doing,” he added, hailing the collaborative nature of the forum.

(RR)