ST JOHN’S, ANTIGUA : Leader of the Opposition Lester Bird has raised eyebrows with his explanation that his ignorance of the Standing Orders is what led to the May 30 dud that should have been a debate on a motion of no-confidence in Prime Minister Baldwin Spencer.
Speaker of the House D Gisele Isaac Arrindell hit the latest volley Tuesday. She was responding to Bird’s explanation a day earlier, when he told OBSERVER Media he did not know he could have delegated the responsibility of moving the motion to someone else after he fell ill and opted to leave the sitting early.
“I am really surprised to hear that because, as a matter of fact, that provision was discussed with the honourable member for St Peter (Asot Michael) who spoke to me on Mr Bird’s behalf in the Chamber,” Isaac Arrindell said on OBSERVER AM yesterday.
The Speaker said she outlined to Michael provisions 30 and 31 of the Standing Orders. Provision 31 allows for the substantive mover of the motion to delegate that responsibility.
“I would be very surprised if he (Michael) would have asked me a question and not relayed the answer (to Bird),” the Speaker of the House said.
Bird, a two-time prime minister and a two-time leader of the opposition, was first elected to Parliament in 1976. Isaac Arrindell said even if Michael did not relay the information to Bird, the ALP leader should have been au fait with the provisions owing to his extensive history as a parliamentarian.
“These standing orders are not new; they were not arrived at yesterday. And so for somebody who has led the government and is now leading the opposition – and for the second time has attempted to bring a no-confidence motion against the prime minister – (this should have been common knowledge),” the Speaker said.
“To hear that he didn’t know of this provision is really, really – for the want of a better word – shocking to me,” she added.
Bird, on Tuesday, said, “I was not aware at the time … that the Standing Order permitted me to let someone else do it.”
However, in his address to the House on May 30, Deputy Chairman of the ALP Gaston Browne displayed the requisite knowledge. “I recognise that the Standing Orders are such that it requires permission in writing from our political leader for someone else to move the motion … It is his desire to present the motion himself,” Browne said.
United Progressive Party (UPP) Public Relations Officer Joanne Massiah joined the debate Tuesday night with a press statement.
Massiah alluded to reasons why the former prime minister failed to move the motion or delegate responsibility for it to be debated.
The UPP public relations officer said a debate on the motion of no-confidence against the prime minister would not have been a “lopsided affair.”
“It is also a fact that all of the parliamentarians present are entitled to speak, and all of the UPP parliamentarians who were present last Wednesday were prepared to debate,” the statement said.
Massiah said the UPP was confident that “the cogent evidence the parliamentarians were ready to present would have been laid some ALP parliamentarians bare.”
In a somewhat cryptic remark, Massiah added, “They know who they are and they also know well the reason for the hasty retreat.”
The comments from the PRO bring recent assertions to the forefront that the former prime minister did not want to debate the motion.
In an interview with OBSERVER Media, political analyst Arvel Grant, like Massiah, said the UPP would have had an opportunity to respond to the challenge.
“I think at some point they decided that even that was not worth the effort … The Honourable Mr (Harold) Lovell did come across as remarkably confident and frighteningly so. Perhaps the Honourable Mr Bird himself may have felt a little embarrassed about the stuff that Mr Lovell laid on the table,” Grant said.
According to the analyst, the ALP may not have had enough backing to win a motion of no confidence, but they could have used the opportunity to gain “kudos in terms of pouring scorn and odium of Baldwin’s policies and practices.”
In Grant’s estimation, the ALP leader’s claims that he was ignorant of the parliamentary procedure were most likely an excuse.
“My opinion is that they didn’t want to do it,” Grant said.
Browne, when he rose, asked for the motion to be deferred but the speaker advised that the rules did not allow this. A new motion must be brought before the Lower House.
You must be logged in to post a comment.