Stone
Balford Henry, Staff Reporter
OPPOSITION SPOKESMAN on the Public Service, Clifton Stone's suggestion that Parliament utilise nearby Headquarter's House to expand its facilities, has resurrected a long-time debate.
Mr. Stone, speaking in the Sectoral Debate on Wednesday, suggested that in the light of negative public reaction towards a new Parliament building, the Government could upgrade the old legislative building and use it for meetings of its committees, making it a "functional adjunct to Gordon House."
However, investigations by The Sunday Gleaner have revealed that this has been on the Government's agenda for the past three decades, but was shelved because of the high cost of refurbishing Headquarter's House and its adjoining buildings.
Clerk to the House, Shirley Lewis, said on Friday that just two years ago the Leader of the House, Dr. Peter Phillips, "from a space and history point of view," had rekindled the suggestion.
The House Committees actually had some meetings there and the Ministry of Works was asked to assess the cost of refurbishing the buildings. However, she said that the cost of structural repairs was much too high and the idea had to be shelved, again.
Mrs. Lewis explained that Headquarters House, itself, is a very old building which has not been maintained. Money which had been allocated to the Ministry of Works in recent years to do repairs had apparently not been spent because of the actual cost.
Turning to another issue raised by Mr. Stone, which is that steno-writers at Gordon House were unable to cope with the workload because of the increasing number of meetings, she said that the situation should improve soon. Mrs. Lewis said that money had already been allocated for the very modern CAT (computer-assisted) system to be introduced, which would transcribe the steno-writers transcripts immediately and store them in the computer for access.
This would allow MPs and the press access to verbatim notes of the proceedings on a daily basis, far removed from the current long waits, triggered by the fact that the steno-writers are unable to complete transcribing their notes because of the numerous meetings. She said that three machines will be purchased soon at a cost of US$3,495 each. A software trainer will be coming to Jamaica in September to teach the writers to use them. However, she was unable to make any predictions about improvements in allowances, including motor vehicle incentives, which are being sought by the steno-writers.
