Concern Over Amendments to Light and Power Bill

The government is being accused of seeking to sideline electricity license interveners through proposed new legislation to be introduced in the House of Assembly, a charge denied by the Minister of Energy and Business Development, Kerrie Symmonds.

According to Parliament’s website, the House of Assembly was on Friday given notice of the Electric Light and Power (Amendment) Bill, 2022. President of the Democratic Labour Party Dr. Ronnie Yearwood and Attorney at Law, Tricia Watson, believe the changes will limit people’s ability to challenge electricity license applications.

Dr. Yearwood sees the bill as an attempt to frustrate the intervener process.

“Persons who are able to object or express concerns have been changed from all interesting parties to the fact that you would have to show merit to why you object. And if your objection is turned down by the committee, there is no review process. Section Six says ‘for the avoidance of doubt, nothing in the section entitles an interested party to have access to the application of the license’ Really it makes a mockery of the process because if you can’t actually review the application, all you have is meaningful introductions or intervention about electricity rate increases in Barbados. ”

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Voice of: President of the Democratic Labour Party Dr. Ronnie Yearwood

But the minister responsible, Kerrie Symmonds, says the amendments only seek to make the intervener process more fair and transparent.

“We just had a simple stand by itself piece of legislation, which said that parties that were interested could object to the grant of a license. but the issue of how that objection was conducted, whether it was done by hearing how you will approach the Ministry for the objection, et cetera, et cetera, was never properly amplified. we now seek to do so in the interest of transparency and fairness in the process. The other point all that the legislation is seeking to do is to ensure that people with a relevant interest can participate in the process.”

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Voice of: Minister of Energy and Business Development, Kerrie Symmonds

However, Intervener Tricia Watson tells Starcom Network she remains gravely concerned about the bill.

“This bill that is being proposed says that intervenors can only address certain limited matters, but then goes on to say that interested parties are not entitled to have access to an application filed by an applicant who will supply electricity to our national grid, so you can intervene, but you cannot get any information on the applicant or the application, ask me, on what basis, would you be intervening. That an intervenor is expected to address that makes a complete mockery of a process that is intended to be consultative and transparent. ”