An election gimmick.
That is what a man is calling an offer of assistance to his elderly mother from the St Michael Central Constituency branch of the Democratic Labour Party.
The man, who would only give his name as “Ikie”, told this newspaper, that six months after constituency representative Steve Blackett personally collected the bill from his 84-year-old mother and told her that he was going to look after the payment, a crew from the Barbados Light and Power turned up yesterday to disconnect her service for non-payment.
The bill was over $300 in arrears.
The angry man told the DAILY?NATION that last November, while Blackett was campaigning in Waterhall Land, Bank Hall, St Michael, with another man named Carson Cadogan, they visited his mother, Muriel Haynes.
“Mr Blackett asked my mother if she had any bills that she wanted help with and my mother said the only bill she had that wasn’t paid as yet was her light bill,” Ikie said.
“He took it from her and told her that he would get the Welfare Department to pay her bill. ”
Ikie said they did not see another light bill come to their house until April when a bill arrived with arrears of $381.