Supplementary Estimates set for historic tabling outside Gordon House
Published:Tuesday | August 30, 2011 | 12:00 AM
Erica Virtue, Senior Gleaner Writer
After more than half a century, Jamaica's parliamentarians will deliberate the nation's business from a location other than George William Gordon House, where they have sat since October 27, 1960.
Parliamentarians returning from their annual summer recess will begin deliberations today, with focus on the Supplementary Estimates of Expenditure, from the Jamaica Conference Centre, located on Kingston's picturesque waterfront. The move has been made necessary because the building named in honour of National Hero George William Gordon, and known as Parliament, is undergoing extensive repairs to its roof.
The public relations office of Parliament said the move would be temporary and Conference Room Five, the same room that housed the Manatt-Dudus commission of enquiry earlier this year, will become the legislative chamber for at least six weeks.
Retired former clerk of the House, Headley Deans, said it was the first time the sittings of the House would take place outside of Gordon House.
"No. I would say the answer to that is no, although I did not give the matter serious thought before you called. But I recall that the last meeting at Headquarters House, was held October 26, 1960, and the first meeting at Gordon House was the following day," Deans told The Gleaner.
Hansard supports claim
Hansard backed up the retired clerk's memory, but former prime minister, Edward Seaga, who served as a member of the Headquarters House and Gordon House legislatures for 43 years, before he retired in 2005, said there might have been one unofficial sitting held outside Gordon House.
"I seem to recall that there was a sitting held at Jamaica House in the 1970s," said Seaga, noting that his recollection should be double-checked.
Deans said if such a sitting had taken place, it would have been an unofficial sitting as he could not recall the Mace being removed from Gordon House.
But history aside, some of the current crop of legislators will be returning to a room of embarrassment.
Conference Room Five is where they were asked questions about the extradition of former Tivoli Gardens strongman Christopher 'Dudus' Coke, and the hiring of United States (US) law firm Manatt, Phelps & Phillips to lobby the US administration in its request for Coke.
With that historical baggage, it is in this room that Finance Minister Audley Shaw will present the first Supplementary Estimates, and it is expected to bring bad news for both Government and Opposition. Shaw has promised to deliver the Government's new spending plan for the year, an update from the $545-billion Budget he presented in April.
The revised Budget must include $10.4 billion to pay public-sector workers, and he must say which capital projects will be stalled and which ones will go ahead.