Turning now to politics and governance, earlier this week PSU president Dean Flowers called out CEO Chester Williams in an interview, urging him to investigate past corruption in the Ministry of Transport. He also challenged the new minister of youth and sports to conduct an internal audit within his ministry- where widespread wastage was reported. We asked the minister about this today where he supported - notionally - the idea of an audit - but was very general on the details:
Anthony Mahler, Minister of Tourism
"Well there should be audits for everything, for statutory boards, that's a normal process and for government institutions that's a normal process, so we are working on those things and we will have to do what we have to do."
"We promised leadership, we promised a plan that we will consult with people and, two, we will work, we will lead by example, Minister Daly and I. We will show that we can get things done, it's not rocket science for us to be able to ensure that we have the programs that can meet the needs of almost 70% of our population. A youth is considered between 14 and 29 and I think 67% of our population would be considered youths and children below, and youths would be considered almost 50% so it's an important demographic in our country. We like to say the youths are our future and I say they are apart of our development now because that's a big range, from 14-29, a lot of people are already working and participating in the economy, they are building homes and having families, so it is an important demographic that we have, especially the ones coming out of those marginalised neighbourhoods that we have to have the programs to capture them. I have said this to the Director of Youth, by the end of this year I would like to know every single, the names of every single young person who is doing well in school but doesn't have the economic means and financial means to continue their education, and we will provide a safety net. In terms of restructuring between youth and sports we have almost 8 million dollars. I believe that with restructuring and improving the efficiencies of the departments that we can accomplish a lot of things out of that money, just the way we managed the money."
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