by TREVOR YEARWOOD

HEALTH, EDUCATION, the water service, transport and motor vehicle licensing are areas the Barbados Government should seriously consider privatising.

This is the view of head of the Barbados Chamber of Commerce and Industry (BCCI), Dick Stoute, an advocate for leaner, more efficient Government.

"To my mind, I think we really need a smaller Government.... We would all be better off with a smaller Government," the businessman said Friday in a presentation during the Democratic Labour Party's (DLP) lunchtime lecture at DLP headquarters on George Street, Belleville.

Referring to the licensing of motor vehicles, he noted, "In other parts of the world that's done by a private sector organisation".

In some countries, "health issues are dealt with by the private sector and reimbursed through Government contributions in various ways", he added. "But in Barbados we feel that health has to be done by Government employees."

In a later interview with the SUNDAY SUN, he spoke of situations in North America where private hospitals provide services for the national health care system.

"If you can get a group of private-sector investors interested in providing medical services and you can fund it at a rate that is competitive with what the [national] hospital is costing, then I think it makes sense for Government. They don't have to worry about providing that hospital infrastructure. The private investors will do that," Stoute reasoned.

He also fingered the local water distribution system. "I think the water works is an area that really needs examination," he commented. He described transportation as an area "ripe" for investment, saying that "whereas we always hear woes from the Transport Board, we tend to get the impression that private-sector operators are profitable".

On education, he suggested that the Government could fund education of local students in what were private institutions which could raise considerable revenue from recruiting foreign students – a job British schools are making "a lot of money" doing.

The businessman told the small gathering that if managed well, privatisation did not mean major job losses. "The work still has to be done," he pointed out. "The more efficiently you do work, the more employment you create."

Stoute listed among his concerns about the local economy the size of the Government debt and Government's big payroll, and high inflation.

Economist Tennyson Beckles and journalist Patrick Hoyos also made presentations and discussed the Barbados economy.