POVERTY?ADVISER Hamilton Lashley, who returned to the Democratic Labour Party (DLP) after he left it to join the Barbados Labour Party (BLP), has accused the former administration of not caring for the poor.
At Wednesday’s DLP meeting at Coach Hill, St John, Lashley said when he left the DLP?party, he left without malice.
“I?left because I was given an opportunity to help poor people and that was all it was, but the Barbados Labour Party don’t respect poor people,” Lashley stated.
With regard to his return to the DLP,?he said:?“I have come into a party and seen these gentlemen and ladies working tirelessly. They are really committed to the cause of developing this country and helping poor people.”
He mentioned the introduction of free bus fares for schoolchildren as the biggest social revolutionary act the country ever had and praised late Prime Minister David Thompson for engineering this and other social policies.
He also spoke highly of Thompson’s accepting him when he returned to the party.
“If there is one person that should carry a hatred and grudge in his heart about me it is David Thompson, but he never did. He did not have one single bad bone as it relates to his experiences . . . because he knew about forgiveness,”?Lashley said.
He also said that Thompson called him from his hospital bed in New York after he [Lashley] was involved in a vehicular accident last year.
He further stated that it was a “foregone conclusion that Mara Thompson will walk up the 52 steps of Parliament”.
(MB)