A tit-for-tat over the disclosure of their finances caused a heated exchange in Parliament between members of the governing party and Bran McCartney, the self-imposed leader of the DNA.
McCartney started the row by accusing Prime Minister Hubert Ingraham of violating the law by not complying with public disclosure laws. The Public Disclosure Act requires that members of parliament publicly disclose theirs, and their immediate family’s, assets, interests and income. Violation of the law is supposed to be an offence punishable by a $10,000 fine, up to two years in jail or both, and additionally the member can have his property forfeited to the Crown.
The law has been rarely, if ever enforced.
When asked by a reporter last year if he had complied with the Act, Mr Ingraham said he had not and that he was “too busy” to do so.
Since then, Ingraham has allegedly made the appropriate disclosures. He told a newspaper earlier this year that he has since complied and has submitted the required information to the public disclosure committee.
McCartney was apparently unaware of that when he rose to his feet during a debate on the 10 crime bills and said:
“As we sit here debating the issue of crime and criminality, the member for North Abaco may himself have failed to comply with certain laws of the Public Disclosure Act. In a public statement sometime last year, the member said that he has not disclosed his assets since 2007.”
Mr Ingraham immediately rose to his feet on a point of order saying, “The member of Parliament for North Abaco has been disclosing since 1978, March, 30 odd years, up to and including the year 2010. Have you disclosed (in) 2010?”
Mr McCartney responded saying, “We have persons who flaunt non-compliance in people’s face while at the same time (creating) laws that do not apply to them to punish everyone else.”
This caused Tommy Turnquest, MP for Mount Moriah, to demand that Mr McCarteny withdraw his statement.
Later, Mr Turnquest said he did not want the Bamboo Town MP to withdraw the comments and that, “we will deal with it in another manner.”
Mr McCartney’s comments also elicited a response from Deputy Prime Minister Brent Symonette, MP for St. Anne’s, who also, initially, wanted Mr McCartney to retract his comments.
“What (Mr McCartney) said was that members here have not disclosed publicly what their assets are. Under the Public Disclosure Act we don’t have to disclose pub- licly, we send in our declaration to the public disclosure committee and then they disclose publicly.”
“Many of us have disclosed to where we are legally required.”
Mr McCartney did not withdraw his statements and the MPs for the government dropped the matter. But not before Mr Ingraham warned all MPs to get up-to-date with the Public Disclosure Commission.
“All members are now on notice that they ought to do their disclosure for 2009 and 2010,” the Prime Minister said.
