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Not our fault, says Sir Lloyd

11/3/2009

BLAME the Bees not the Dems.

That’s how former Prime Minister Sir Lloyd Erskine Sandiford has responded to suggestions that the ruling Democratic Labour Party (DLP) is responsible for the island’s decline on the United Nations Human Development Index.

Last week in the Upper House Barbados Labour Party (BLP) Senator Elizabeth
Thompson pointed to Barbados’ rating drop and blamed it on the policies of the DLP government that was voted into office in January last year.

In response, Sir Lloyd, who pointed out that during his tenure Barbados had attained its highest ever ranking on the index, said the rankings were typically compiled using data over a two year period the blame could not be the David Thompson administration’s.

He stated this view while addressing a Young Democrats meeting last Saturday night at DLP headquarters, George Street, Belleville, St. Michael.

“This is no decline in the actions or results from the Democratic Labour Party. This shows up or illustrates the performance of two years ago. That is what the Human Development Index is. It reflects the activities of two years. Who was the government in office at that time? Just think,” the former Prime Minister, who is set to be Barbados’ first resident Ambassador to China, stated.

“Now if two years from now the figure is still hovering in the 40s don’t blame me, you can’t use that argument, but right now you can say those figures reflect performances of the economy of Barbados based on education, health and the per capita income.
They take those three indices and make a composite index...to compare what happens in China, what happens in Korea, that is how it is arrived at,” he asserted.

Sir Lloyd said Barbadians could still be proud that their country “is ahead of a lot of big countries in the world” and that he was happy that during his administration the country had reached heights never again achieved on the UN index.

“In the latest figures that came out on the Human Development Index Barbados is at number 41, the first time that it has gone into that territory. They can say whatever they like about Lloyd Erskine Sandiford (but) you just ask them to look at the record.
When he was Prime Minister Barbados reached the highest point that it has ever reached on that index of human development and that we are at 40 or 41 today, a fall from where we were last year,” according to him.

He said Barbados was fortunate in many ways, including its education system and that its small size was a good thing in some ways.

“Barbados is fortunate in many ways. We are a small country so next door you can find a school to send your school child, you don’t have to go over a hill, so we are fortunate in that particular regard. We don’t have a large land space to keep clean so we are fortunate in that regard. So I hope that we continue and see that there is a lot of work to be done,” the official noted.

Indices

as of close 9/15/2009


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