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The debate continued into the night and the session didn't end until about 7:40 pm when the Budget passed the third reading. As is required by custom, the Prime Minister wound up the debate with a withering review of the budget response by the leader of the opposition. He did that and held forth on the performances by other opposition members as well - they didn't stick around to listen, but that didn't stop him from going Nagaski on them:

Hon. Dean Barrow, Prime Minister
"The Leader of the Opposition, the Member for Freetown completely misses the mark. We don't refer to the political and economic devastation elsewhere, on any misery-loves-company basis or as any explanation of our straightened circumstances, not at all because we don't have straightened circumstances. Rather, when we survey the wreckage elsewhere, it is for the purpose of marking, underlining and even boasting about the fact that Belize, our country, our economy, and our government have done well, comparatively speaking. We have done so very remarkably well. But I can't sit down without commenting on some of the more revealing aspects of the presentation by some of the senior so called leaders on the other side. Now, Mr. Speaker, the Leader of the Opposition did not have - as I said - the courtesy to stay for the conclusion of the debate, and it is not disrespecting me. He is disrespecting his constituency and the people of Belize."

"But after he made an incredibly petty speech, he turned around and asked this side of the House to put aside the same pettiness that he had just finished employing. Let me turn quickly, Mr. Speaker, to the member for Fort George - well you know, earlier I had to warn him about staying in this place too long. Now, he is proof that politicians well pass their prime who don't retire, become clowns and comedians. I personally think like the Minister of State in the Ministry of Sports that it is sad to see a former prime minister reduce to telling de-notic jokes about Guatemala and horses confiscated by the BDF and bolting across the border. Man, is this what the former prime minister has come to, providing antic relief to this House? What was most instructive was his formula for solving the crime and violence problem in Belize; legalize marijuana; that is what the ex-prime minister came up with as his sole policy prescription for solving crime and violence. Legalize marijuana."

"Well, I don't know about anyone else but it made me wonder if that is so that he can ask in the open, what perhaps he may well have been doing in secret all these years. And if I am right Mr. Speaker, it will explain the bizarre behavior that is so much a part of his history - the utter lack of any political or personal compass; the signing of the Telemedia accommodation agreements and the UHS guarantee; the Belize Bank loan notes and settlement deeds; and the illegal income tax exemptions to the every profit extracting foreign millionaire manager of the Ashcroft Alliance. Maybe, just maybe these were results of mixing sensimina with his Puro. And then finally Mr. Speaker there was the pretender from Cayo South. This, Mr. Speaker, is the designer to the rich and famous and the man who would be king. He showed himself - and I am sorry he isn't here to hear it as nothing more than - I saw that movie with my daughter; Nothing more than a " Beverly Hills Chihuahua " trying to put some false bass in his bark, in order to try and run with the big dogs."

"He wears this his ignorance of parliamentary procedure as some proud garment that somehow is proof of virtue and he yaps and yelps in disrespect to you, Mr. Speaker, as though uncouth behavior and bad manners are a sign of strength and machismo. I don't know if he is over compensating for his glitterati lifestyle by trying to show that he can get down and dirty with the campesinos. But, I'll tell you, Mr. Speaker, he is no campesino, he is merely a peasant."

Now approved by the house, the Budget next goes to the Senate which meets on Wednesday at 9:00 am.