Premier David Burt On Purchase Of Building
“If the government is paying rent to itself as opposed to private accommodations, we will reduce the budget or be able to have more money to spend on the things that matter,” Premier and Minister of Finance David Burt told the House of Assembly.
The Premier was answering questions about the government’s purchase of a new building during the ‘Premier’s Question Period,’ which was held in the House of Assembly on Friday,
80 second audio extract with the Premier answering questions about the building:
OBA MP Patricia Gordon Pamplin asked the Premier, “Is there any reason, strategy behind purchasing a new building for government, when there are significant government properties…”
In response, the Premier said, “The rationale is very simple. First thing is that the government has rented significant space in that building for a while. The building came up for an offer for sale, and the Bermuda Housing Corporation through the Ministry of Public Works has acquired the building.
“In addition to that, there are a number of government entities that are in private accommodations, and if the government is paying rent to itself as opposed to private accommodations, we will reduce the budget, or be able to have more money to spend on the things that matter.
“The Minister of Public Works has managed the estate well, and we look forward to not only inhabiting that building, but kitting out that building and the top floor for the Ministry of National Security to have a fintech co-working space to advance our fintech ambitions.”
As Bernews previously reported the Government recently purchased a building in Hamilton, and the top floor will be put “aside for a co-working space.
Speaking at the OECD Roundtable earlier this month, Minister of National Security Wayne Caines said, “In order to foster and facilitate innovation, and provide a platform for companies to get off the ground running once they set-up shop, the Bermuda Government is in the planning stages of building a state-of-the art co-working space for incoming industry players.
“This purpose built facility will allow technology companies to domicile in Bermuda and have access to a premium facility with a plethora of services at hand. Companies will have access to a co-working space, private board room, lounge areas, high speed internet, and concierge services,” Minister Caines said.
32-minute audio of the full Premier’s Question Period:
The full audio of the Premier’s Question Period [PQP] is above, and we will post additional extracts and transcriptions as able, and if you have a specific portion you want to see posted as an extract please feel free to leave a comment or send us an email.
The PQP is set to take place every second Friday of each month that the House is in session for a time period of thirty minutes, with the Leader of the Opposition allocated three questions, and other Members can each ask one question, and two supplemental questions.
Except the Premier – and the OBA – have missed the point. First there was the RFI for a tech hub at Southside (which was extended because of the amount of interest) and then there was talks of moving it to Hamilton.
Now we have Govt spending $3m at least in order to have tech hub?
What happened in between?
And … where is this $3m (probably four million as I don’t see Arbitrade coming) coming from?
The Premier is being disengenous the OBA is clueless.
Agreed.
Agreed to what exactly? It’s people like you who used to be in IT who are now IT irrelevant and so you feel as if you are qualified to comment on something as important as FinTech? Stay retired or stay fired I should say! I hope the Airbnb is working out for you all. We should raise taxes on that to keep you all quiet and focused on your business instead of commenting on ours!
UBP and their supporters have been collecting rent from Government forever.
Get over it and hang on for de ride.
This man is a work horse.
I still don’t understand why all this fintech stuff is under the remit of National Security and not finance or economic development
Because it’s our courts that will suffer when the waves of issues hit.
“If the government is paying rent to itself as opposed to private accommodations, we will reduce the budget or be able to have more money to spend on the things that matter,” Premier and Minister of Finance David Burt told the House of Assembly.”
If he really thinks that then we guys alllllllllll doomed! lmfao
Simply astonishing isn’t it…utterly clueless.
Except of course that Burt just borrowed the money to buy the building locking Bermuda into an even higher perpetual mortgage.
Burtmath.
Thats what you call Progressive thinking.
No pun intended.
Don’t worry. No pun perceived.
lol
You will discover soon that this is all smoke and mirrors.
Just like Faith Based Tourism, Black Mayors Conference, Hamilton dock redevelopment, Par-La-Ville Hotel, etc etc etc.
Progressive thinking like this will doom this island. Then, when things get really bad it will all be blamed on racism. THAT is the extent of progressive thinking in this govt.
There’s nothing progressive about the PLP.
Our debt level is getting Progressively worse
For the life of me I simply cannot figure out how buying another building to add to Government’s portfolio is better value than refurbishing one it already owns.
That said, there is of course one obvious question. Who makes money out of this?
Burt can’t do the math.
How come we never hear about our debt anymore. Has our money trees paid it off quietly.
Buy a building with borrowed money and pay rent to yourself.
This is Burt’s idea to reduce debt.
Infantile.