You didn’t have to be in the Legislative Assembly (LA) on Wednesday to witness an exhibition unbecoming of children let alone the leaders of our country. You could watch it yourselves on the Government’s own television channel CIGTV.

Why the Speaker of the House, Hon. Mary Lawrence, didn’t do more to stop the tirades and anger from opposition leader, Hon. Alden McLaughlin, and especially from Premier, Hon. McKeeva Bush, is a puzzle.

I have known Mrs. Lawrence for a long time and she has always appeared a very strong person. When she was appointed I applauded it.

However, she allowed the anger to flow, the tirading and almost foam falling from the mouths of the combatants to continue almost without censure.

The debate was supposed to have been the closure presentation on the amendment to the Public Management and Finance Law to incorporate the Framework for Fiscal Responsibility (FFR) agreement but went far away from the boundaries of that topic.

The premier even managed to bring up the subject of the sale of the Ritz Carlton-Cayman in his presentation even though I could and still cannot understand what it had to with the FFR.

He claimed he did not miss the chance to collect the outstanding duty, that the new owners were responsible for. He said that the firm (Five Mile Capital – RC Cayman’s parent company) knew about the outstanding duty when they bought the loan and it had tried to negotiate paying government’s $6 million based on a long list of concession he would not agree to.

Bush said the new owners wanted to negotiate over the duty, had included reductions in the work permit fees, stamp duty on the sale and future sales, as well as new duty concessions, the rights to make their own desalinated water on site, the right to buy the freehold and expedited changes in licence, and “other things.”

“The government does not give into threats,” he stormed and said the new owner’s claim the opportunity to collect on the $6M was “simply not the case.”

This was in reply to RC Cayman’s claim they had made an offer to government about the duty but it was contingent on entering into an agreement with the Cayman Islands Government before the auction last month. They also claimed that, despite many requests, the government had given them no response back.

It is obvious Bush has a “soft spot” for the previous owner, Michael Ryan, claiming the new owners began to “pursue an aggressive strategy of driving out Ryan” to take control of the hotel.

Finally on that subject, he said the Ritz Carlton was worth far more than the new owners paid and that it had been recently valued at over $468M and incredibly accused the opposition leader of trying to help Richard Finlay, the attorney from Conyers Dill & Pearman representing them, to threaten government as Finlay was a former law partner of the leader of the opposition.

“The government has reached out a helping hand to the new group,” he tiraded, “and will continue to do so but their cohorts should explain why they gave away the windfall,” claiming the Peoples Progressive Movement (PPM) were to blame for the debt being unsecured. “I have the papers to prove that it was the PPM’s fault because the debt had been secured by the property but the opposition took it away,” he added.

This prompted an understandable angry reaction from the PPM leader, McLaughlin, and he demanded the speaker to make Bush withdraw the allegations he was either supporting or assisting the new owners or that his party, when they were in power, had changed the status of Ryan’s duty debt.

He also told the LA he was a partner of Finlay’s over twelve years ago before he was elected as an MLA.

McLaughlin also took the opportunity to attack the government’s record in office. He also mentioned the three government backbench MLA’s who have indicated they are going to vote “No” to the FFR Bill proposal when it actually gets there.

“As the FFR is a government motion, the potential backbench revolt could be perceived as a vote of no confidence in the government,” he claimed.

“If the premier and his government are not ashamed and embarrassed about how this played out, I am downright embarrassed,” he thundered. “This makes us all look as though we are playing at some Micky Mouse parliament!”

He then pointed to the waste of the LA’s time, with members debating the bill at length last week only to come and find, when the House returned, that the premier had brought yet another bill.

“Members now have a new and different bill before them to debate, he said, and finally it now complies with what the premier had committed the Cayman Islands to with the UK a year ago.”

Then it was Bush’s turn to continue an attack with such ferocity it had to be seen to be believed.

“No matter how much they believe McKeeva is bad, no matter how much they try to paint me crooked, I am not. But the only way they can succeed is to convince the people and ruin me. I have made mistakes in my life but committed no illegalities,” he shouted. “Those who write things to damage us, and they will continue because I stand up to them, and take my name and scandalise it, I stand against them and those who would sell their grandmother to be premier!!”

There’s a lot more I could report and say but it is all quite irrevelant.

The outcome is that there was no vote and the FFR Bill has still not been voted into law.

As for the three backbenchers who said on Friday (9) they will vote against the FFR it is not being clever at all. It is foolish as is Ellio Solomon’s wish to have a referendum over the issue he announced on television. After the debacle and cost of the last one his party instigated I choked on my tea.

This is all an exhibition I am not proud of and neither should any of the combatants who were there. They are all being watched by the government’s own television station none of us voted for, and did we really want?