Payne sets record straight

The Barbados Labour Party (BLP) has challenged statements attributed to Transport Board general manager Sandra Forde, on the board’s handling of its request, made on February 15, to charter 15 buses for its annual Heroes Day picnic on the East Coast Saturday.

A BLP statement yesterday on behalf of chairman George Payne said that during a site visit Tuesday, he told reporters the party was yet to receive a response from the Transport Board. “I saw this as a politically-influenced rejection of our request in an election year and that we had made alternative arrangements by deciding to hire 185 coaches, ZRs and minibuses to make sure that transportation is not a problem”. 

The BLP said that when the site visit began at 11 a.m., it had not received any response from the board. It added the email referred to by Forde was sent from the marketing department at 11:26 a.m., “almost half an hour after the site visit began”.

The Bees added that prior to Tuesday’s meeting, the only piece of correspondence they had received from the board was an email on April 3 from marketing manager Lynda Holder, apologising for the “delayed response” to the February 15 request and a promise to give a definitive response by April 4. “No such response was received,” the release added. (JS/PR)