The Tribune

By MALCOLM STRACHAN

THE Speaker of the House took centre stage last week – and not in a good way.

She took issue with the director of NEMA, but the manner in which she did so was questionable to say the least.

Patricia Deveaux, who is both Speaker of the House and MP for Bamboo Town, was upset after a tornado touched down in her constituency on Wednesday – and felt her calls to Captain Stephen Russell did not meet with the right response.

The Speaker said various agencies did respond to her calls for help – but that NEMA and its director were absent. She said she did speak to Captain Russell, and he directed her to the Ministry of Works.

She said she warned Captain Russell she would speak on the matter at the next sitting of Parliament – and when she did, she didn’t hold back.

She said: “What I did not see on the ground was NEMA and I am saying this because I reached out to Commander Russell.”

A side note, he’s a Captain and a director of NEMA – but that’s a small matter. She continued: “I don’t know if he was home busy watching the game ‘cause I hear they had a game last night, but I could say that he was not there and that is who we have to reach out for emergency response.

“I am terribly, terribly disturbed by that and I say to him, I told him, I did not lie to him, I told him that I would speak to it from my chair. This is where I have my voice.”

She added: “I had senior citizens at the age of 80 who had live wires, electrical wire hanging and also no roof and no electricity last night. They had to go to be with such damage to their house and what I can say is we had the team on the ground, but NEMA was not present.

“Natural disasters do not happen between nine and five. Natural disasters can happen at any time, in the dead of night and so I say this to say these people if they want a desk job from 9 to 5 give them their desk job cause I had a natural disaster last night and the minister and all of these other persons were on the ground until 9pm last night trying to help me bring some resolve…

“So, you tell Mr Russell for me if he is listening, let me tell you, you need a 9 to 5 job because I call 7, 8 o’clock in the night you telling me Ministry of Works? The Ministry of Works was already on the ground so the only persons that were not present was NEMA.”

It’s a very unusual thing for a public servant to be criticised by name in the House. In fact, whenever an MP calls someone out who cannot defend themselves in the House, those MPs would generally be told they could do no such thing. Who by? Well, the Speaker.

So, when the Speaker does it, that’s a very disturbing development. Does that mean it’s open season for MPs to criticise who they like without those people having any way to respond in that forum? Will the Speaker allow that? After all, what’s good for the goose…

In casting aspersions that Captain Russell was perhaps busy watching the game, just because she “hear they had a game last night” is reprehensible. You cannot make a statement like that in the House without any evidence to back it up – you’re impugning the reputation of a senior civil servant.

Now perhaps there was a communication problem. Perhaps NEMA could have done better. The organisation released its own timeline of events, in which it was stated that at no time did the agency receive reports of residents in the Bamboo Town area being affected by tornadic activity – so there appears to have been some shortfall in communication.

But calling out a named individual in Parliament is not the way to deal with that – nor sullying their reputation.

It’s an overstep by the Speaker, the kind she ought to clamp down on if it came from anyone else in the House, let alone avoid completely as the person sitting in the chair.

Opposition leader Michael Pintard was quick to speak on the matter too, calling it “inappropriate”.

He said: “We have to be careful… that in speaking up for our constituents we don’t do so at the expense of others and unfortunately we thought that the manner in which NEMA, Captain Russell, was characterised was most inappropriate and unfortunate.

“In fact I rose after the Acting Prime Minister to make the point that NEMA is a coordinating agency. Immediately after a catastrophe that particular director need not be present as long as they are doing their job coordinating other agencies that are necessary to show up and later in the afternoon it appears that the facts confirmed that was exactly what happened.

“We have to be careful as parliamentarians, FNMs included, that we do not negatively characterise defenceless citizens and veteran public servants who are not in the House of Assembly and cannot defend themselves unless some amazing facts emerge that prove otherwise.

“The Speaker owes Captain Russell an apology.”

Mr Pintard is right. Captain Russell is owed an apology.

By basic principle, people should not be attacked in a manner in which they are unable to defend themselves. The Speaker is right to speak up for her community, but she is wrong to attack an individual who cannot defend themselves in the process.