标签： Barbados

After months of coordinated advocacy and bureaucratic negotiations over three years of unresolved labor disputes, a landmark agreement has been reached that will see Berger Paints clear all outstanding financial obligations to its former employees by September 11. The breakthrough was confirmed at the Barbados Workers’ Union (BWU) 84th Annual Delegates’ Conference, held at the union’s Solidarity House headquarters, by BWU General Secretary Toni Moore.

Youth advocate and social worker Natalie Murray has put forward a bold proposal to address a growing gap in post-school support for young Barbadians: the creation of a unified national framework that consolidates scattered government-run youth opportunities into a single, accessible system. Speaking at the St Andrews Ideas Forum hosted at the Alleyne School on Thursday, Murray explained that while dozens of programs for young people exist across public agencies, their fragmentation leaves many graduating students unable to find clear pathways to productive next steps after leaving secondary school.

Murray outlined that the core mission of the proposed framework is not to dictate young people’s future choices, but to meet them where they are, connect them to existing resources, and clear the navigation barriers that leave many adrift. Whether a young person’s goal is enrolling in university, pursuing technical training, starting an apprenticeship, entering full-time employment, launching a small business, working in agriculture, tech, the creative industries, or stepping into community leadership, the framework would ensure they can easily identify and access the support tailored to their path.

Key components of Murray’s plan include a centralized national online portal that lists every government-aligned youth program, regardless of which department oversees it. She noted during her research that current programs are siloed across labor, youth affairs, and education departments, leaving even motivated young people unaware of opportunities that could change their trajectories. She also called for mandatory youth transition planning to begin six to 12 months before a student graduates from secondary school, a step that is currently missing from most schools’ support structures. Too many young people leave school without any clear plan, she argued, not because no opportunities exist, but because no one has sat down with them early to map out a personalized path forward.

Murray added that the framework should also include a national database to track outcomes for young people after they leave school, allowing policymakers and support providers to identify disconnected youth and intervene early. She specifically highlighted the 19 to 29 age group, where a large share of young people have become disconnected from education, work, and training. Research links this disconnection to higher rates of involvement in harmful activity, she noted, and the proposed system would partner with existing government initiatives such as the life coach program run by the Ministry of People Empowerment to reach disconnected youth and reintegrate them as productive members of Barbadian society. The framework would also embed mental health screening into early transition planning, ensuring that young people struggling with psychosocial challenges are connected to the support they need to get back on track, rather than being left behind.

Barbados Prime Minister Mia Mottley has publicly endorsed Murray’s proposal, confirming that it aligns with the current government’s youth-focused policy agenda. However, Mottley emphasized that systemic change alone is not enough: the effort requires ordinary Barbadians to step up as volunteer mentors to support the next generation. She pointed to the planned expansion of 60 hours of experiential co-curricular learning as a core curriculum requirement, which exposes young people to opportunities ranging from cadets and youth groups to sports and cultural activities. This expansion can only succeed if enough adult volunteers step forward to lead and mentor these programs, she said.

Mottley reiterated the government’s long-stated goal of building a Barbados that centers young people while upholding care for aging citizens. She stressed that the nation cannot advance if young people cannot see a future for themselves at home or choose to leave for opportunities elsewhere. Mottley added that successful local youth programs should be scaled into national initiatives rather than remaining isolated, small-scale projects, noting that piecemeal efforts cannot deliver nationwide transformation.

Drawing on a formative experience from 2017, Mottley recalled meeting 15 young men between the ages of 25 and 30 under a roadside shed, where she learned at least 12 had been unemployed since leaving school. She admitted that a previous national initiative to track youth outcomes, called Youth Traces, eventually collapsed, leaving the government without clear data on disconnected youth. Moving forward, she said, communities have a critical shared responsibility to support young people, alongside government: cultural and social values that anchor young people cannot be taught through policy alone, they must be modeled and passed on by community members.

Mottley issued a public call for all Barbadians to volunteer three to four hours each week to help mentor and shape the next generation, warning that failing to engage leaves young people’s outcomes to chance. She has also directed Minister of Education Transformation Chad Blackman to conduct a full review of gaps in existing youth organizations, publicize all available opportunities via local media, and encourage more Barbadians to volunteer their time to support youth.

Barbados’ leading tourism authority is taking decisive steps to elevate its visitor safety standards, bringing roughly 130 tourism industry professionals through a specialized training program focused on emergency response for incidents involving travelers. The initiative, led by the Barbados Tourism Marketing Inc. (BTMI), aims to strengthen the island nation’s capacity to manage high-stakes critical situations that can arise during a visitor’s trip.

Althea O’Neal, BTMI’s Guest Experience Manager, emphasized that how local tourism operators respond to an emergency can leave a lasting impression on how visitors perceive the entire Barbados travel experience. In an address ahead of the training, O’Neal noted that preparedness and competent response are non-negotiable in today’s competitive global tourism landscape, saying, “We want to ensure that our tourism partners, our tourism professionals, are equipped to manage these situations well because the world is watching.”

Hosted on Friday at the Lloyd Erskine Sandiford Centre, the workshop marked the first official Critical Incident Awareness & Response training program tailored specifically for Barbados’ tourism workforce. O’Neal pointed out that travelers today have no shortage of alternative destinations to choose from, making the island’s handling of crises a key differentiator for its long-term tourism success. She explained that a complete, high-quality visitor experience extends far beyond the enjoyable moments of a vacation, encompassing how stakeholders respond when the unexpected occurs.

“A seamless guest experience covers every touchpoint, from the moment a visitor books their trip through their arrival at the airport, interactions with taxi drivers, stays at accommodation, and visits to local attractions,” O’Neal explained. “But it also includes how we respond to critical incidents that occur right here at Destination Barbados.” She added that a wide range of unplanned events can impact travelers, and it falls to all connected tourism stakeholders to act efficiently, contain potential damage, and reassure visitors that their well-being is the island’s top priority.

The workshop brought together a cross-sector team of expert facilitators to cover all key dimensions of critical incident response. Marlon Charles led sessions focused on crisis support for affected visitors, while Station Sergeant Jamal Mohan from the Barbados Police Service shared insights on core safety and security protocols. Simon Alleyne, a representative from Barbados’ Department of Emergency Management, led discussions on emergency preparedness frameworks, and practicing medical experts guided participants through best practices for handling medical and injury-related emergencies.

Critical incidents can occur in any corner of the tourism ecosystem, O’Neal noted, from hotel properties and watercraft excursions to popular visitor attractions across the island. “That initial response really makes a difference to the outcome of these situations so we felt that it was very important to equip our stakeholders as it relates to critical incidents in the tourism space,” she said.

O’Neal closed by reaffirming the shared responsibility of all Barbados tourism professionals to protect travelers who choose the island for their vacation. The Caribbean destination has long been celebrated for its warm hospitality, and O’Neal argued that this reputation should extend to crisis management too. “We should also strive to be known as a destination that protects life, responds with compassion, and manages difficult situations with excellence,” she said. “When a visitor is having the best holiday of their life, we want to make that experience memorable for all the right reasons. But when something unexpected and potentially traumatic happens, we also need to make sure that visitors know that Barbados cares, and that is the experience we want to create.”

Nearly two years after a devastating lightning strike triggered a catastrophic fire at Barbados’ national Archives Department, ongoing recovery, structural repair and heritage protection work is still progressing, according to the island’s Minister of Pan African Affairs and Heritage Trevor Prescod. The destructive blaze broke out just minutes before midnight on June 18, 2024, ripping through a two-story building at the department’s Black Rock, St. Michael campus that held generations of irreplaceable historic national documents. In the immediate aftermath of the fire, chief archivist Ingrid Thompson confirmed that only a small fraction of the records stored in the damaged Block D could be saved from the destruction. Prescod recently spoke with local publication Barbados TODAY following an on-site inspection of the recovery work, where he received a full briefing from department leadership on the status of structural repairs, new specialized equipment installations, and safety protocols put in place to protect surviving archival collections. “It is clear that while we have restored the roof over the burned area, we have not yet completed interior finishing work on that section of the building,” Prescod explained. Beyond patching up fire-related damage, government authorities have prioritized hardening the entire archives facility against future natural and environmental hazards, rolling out new specialized protective infrastructure to mitigate risks to the remaining buildings and their holdings. “We are installing a wide range of specialized devices and safety equipment designed to reduce the threat of similar damage to the entire site,” Prescod noted. In response to growing public concern over the safety of surviving one-of-a-kind historical documents, Prescod moved to reassure residents that all valuable archival materials have already been relocated away from the high-risk damaged zone. “Right now, all surviving collections are secured in an alternative location away from the area where lightning struck and hit the building,” he said. “We are making consistent progress, and all materials remain protected.” Basic construction and technical supplies have been imported to support the ongoing work, Prescod confirmed, though he added that key technical installation processes are still ongoing and have not yet been finalized. When asked whether a full public report detailing the full scope of damage, a breakdown of lost versus salvaged items, and a formal damage assessment had been completed, Prescod said he could not provide a firm timeline for the document’s release. He did note, however, that work is ongoing to restore as many damaged records as possible, and that off-site preservation and large-scale digitization projects are underway in partnership with other local organizations. A selection of surviving records has already been transferred to the R.O.A.D (Restoring Our Atlantic Destiny) digitization initiative based on Harbour Road, where they will be digitized for long-term preservation and public access. In addition to fire recovery work, Prescod confirmed that structural maintenance and masonry repairs are ongoing across other sections of the broader archives campus, pushing back against recent rumors that construction of a completely new standalone facility had already begun. “We are carrying out targeted repairs across the existing site right now; masons are on-site doing that work,” he explained. He also revealed that maintenance teams are currently addressing a separate major structural issue on the site’s eastern perimeter, caused by invasive tree roots that have compromised the building’s outer wall. “Tree roots have grown through and penetrated the eastern wall of the archives building, which has created a major structural integrity issue,” Prescod said. Technical engineering teams are currently evaluating two potential solutions to fix the damage: constructing a new reinforced interior supporting wall, or demolishing and fully reconstructing the compromised section of the outer wall. Prescod emphasized that despite the range of complex operational and environmental challenges the department has faced since the fire, the dedicated teams leading recovery work remain fully committed to stabilizing the facility’s infrastructure, protecting the island’s priceless historical heritage, and completing all critical repairs to return the archives to full public functionality.

At Thursday evening’s St Andrew Ideas Forum, a 36-year veteran of law enforcement made a forceful case for expanding supervised rehabilitative programs for young people charged with low-level offences, warning that permanent criminal convictions create lifelong barriers to economic and personal advancement.

Jonathan Best, who retired after a decades-long career in policing, laid out a structured alternative model for handling minor youth offending that would keep young people out of prison and free of permanent criminal records. He used a common example of a young person involved in a first-time physical altercation to illustrate his proposal: instead of immediate conviction and sentencing, the young person would be released to supervised home custody with clear conduct requirements, and their court case would be adjourned for a 90-day probationary period.

During those three months, Best explained, the young person would be required to return to school or another learning program, or secure stable employment, with magistrates able to connect participants to pre-vetted job openings through court support staff. If the young person meets the requirements after the initial three-month period, the case would be extended for an additional three months. After a full year of consistent positive progress – no reoffending, steady enrollment in education or full-time work – the case could be dismissed entirely, leaving the young person with no permanent criminal conviction on their record.

Best emphasized that even minor, decades-old convictions continue to derail young people’s lives long after they have turned away from crime. He shared firsthand observations of young people who were fired from jobs after employers discovered old minor convictions on their police clearance certificates, and others who were blocked from employment and international travel entirely due to their criminal records. “For petty offences, people should be given multiple chances,” Best argued. “We talk about second chances, but we should be willing to give third, even fourth chances if that is what it takes. I know it sounds unusual coming from a former police officer, but locking young people out of opportunity for minor mistakes only pushes them deeper into a cycle of crime. We do not want a 16-year-old ending up involved in violent armed offending because we closed off every other path to them.”

In response to Best’s proposal, Attorney General Wilfred Abrahams clarified that the current government already follows a diversion-first philosophy for minor youth offending, and has rejected the practice of issuing permanent convictions for simple mistakes that would ruin young people’s life prospects. Abrahams noted that a range of existing social programs, including the Youth Advanced Corp, already work to divert at-risk young people away from the criminal justice system entirely, rather than pushing them into conviction and punishment. He confirmed that diversion programs would not be extended to serious violent offences, however – anyone caught with a firearm, or involved in a shooting, regardless of age, would face full criminal prosecution and penalties.

“This government is not seeking to stain anybody’s record and cripple them for life over something that is just a mistake,” Abrahams said. “Our policy is to divert people out of the traditional criminal justice system and into rehabilitative, corrective, nurturing environments that help them get back on track. We recognize that not every young person has the same stable family support that many of us took for granted growing up, so we need to meet them where they are.”

Abrahams added that the government is currently building new dedicated facilities to accommodate youth diversion programming, which is focused on intervening early with at-risk young people still in the school system, providing targeted support before they end up involved in crime or in conflict with the law.

In a sudden turn of proceedings at a local magistrates court, a 51-year-old man from Reece Road, Britttons Hill has reversed his initial partial guilty plea and admitted to all three cannabis-related offenses brought against him.

When the case was first called, magistrate Manila Renee read out the three charges against Winston St Alban Alleyne. The defendant initially only entered a guilty plea for simple possession of cannabis, maintaining not guilty pleas for two more severe charges: trafficking a quantifiable amount of the controlled substance and possessing cannabis with intent to supply. All three offenses are alleged to have occurred on a Thursday evening.

Prior to the change of plea, law enforcement officer Sergeant Kenmore Phillips had already confirmed he had no objections to granting bail to Alleyne, but no approved surety was present at the court when the hearing began. By the time Alleyne’s surety arrived at the courthouse, the defendant made an unexpected request: he asked for all charges to be read a second time to the court. After the charges were re-read, Alleyne changed all of his pleas to guilty.

Details of the arrest were presented to the court, outlining that uniformed police were conducting routine patrols along Fairchild Street in the Vincy Town district when they spotted Alleyne rolling a cigarette. Officers detected a strong, distinct odor of marijuana emanating from the area where Alleyne was standing, so they approached him to share their suspicions and request to search his person and belongings. Alleyne consented to the search without objection, and during a check of his haversack, law enforcement found a clear plastic bag holding the suspected cannabis.

Forensic testing confirmed the seized substance weighed 37.19 grams, with an estimated street value of $190. A review of Alleyne’s criminal history showed his most recent prior conviction dated back to 2010, for a similar cannabis-related offense.

In her sentencing decision, Magistrate Renee chose to convict, reprimand and discharge Alleyne on all three charges, including the possession, trafficking, and intent to supply counts. She explained her lenient decision in open court, noting “It was not a large amount, you did not waste the court’s time and your antecedents are very old. So you can go.”