Speaker and ex-CO escape PAC scrutiny

| 16/01/2015 | 7 Comments
Cayman News Service

Juliana O’Conor-Connolly, Speaker of the Cayman Islands Legislative Assembly (Photo by Dennie Warren Jr)

(CNS): Neither the former minister for District Administration, Works, Lands and Agriculture (DAWLA), Juliana O’Conor-Connolly, nor the former chief officer, Kearney Gomez, were called by the Public Accounts Committee Wednesday as it examined a critical audit report. And few questions were asked of the current chief officer or the former chief financial about some of the damning revelations in the report concerning that ministry’s travel and hospitality expenses during the time that O’Connor-Connolly, who is now speaker of the House, and Gomez were both in office.

In particular, no explanations were given about the massive write-offs of travel advances that were never reconciled and said to have been incurred by a senior official in that ministry. Nor was any light shone on why O’Connor-Connolly spent significant sums on hotel accommodation for herself and her former executive aide in her own constituency of Cayman Brac, even though she had a home on the island.

Although McKeeva Bush had not answered a lot of questions when he was in the hot seat during the PAC hearing, he had offered a defence and justification of his own spending and that of his staff when he headed up the tourism and finance ministry, which had accounted for the largest amount of travel and hospitality spending.

Bush was the only member of PAC to question why the details of who had run up travel bills of tens of thousands of dollars in O’Connor-Connolly’s ministry without ever accounting for them had not been identified and asked for more details about the write-offs, but there were no answers.

Alan Jones, who took over as ministry’s chief officer following Gomez’s retirement, and the former CFO were questioned in general terms about the overall management and difficulties getting receipts and accountability from the minister. However, no one was asked and no answers emerged over why O’Connor-Connolly had run up a bill of some $34,000 on Brac hotels. No one asked and there were no answers over why the ministry had spent $45,742 on trip to a postal conference in Qatar or why the minister received a much higher per diem rate when travelling than anyone else, among a number of other controversial revelations in the report.

The CFO was asked about the issues relating to the lack of documentation supporting travel for the minister and senior staff. She explained that she had brought this to the chief officer’s attention but nothing was done, and so, despite knowing that she needed better quality information, she was not able to get it.

There was no explanation as to why PAC did not call O’Connor-Connolly or Gomez and the issue of the write-offs was not addressed.

Jones, who is now the CO in an altered but similar ministry, said he had introduced a tighter regime and that the possibility of civil servants running up debts would not be possible in future. He warned, however, that as a result of what is written in General Orders, civil servants still could not force ministers to adhere to the travel policy, and those regulations also provide for ministers and chief officers to continue signing off on their own spending.

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Category: Government oversight, Politics

Comments (7)

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  1. Haranguer says:

    She was interviewed privately and it was decided that wasting the people’s money is no big deal for Bracers so why don’t you all SHADDAPP!

  2. justsaying says:

    Add Winston Connolly’s shambolic performance on Rooster last week. He clearly knew nothing of the subject (education), had failed to prepare. This man ignores his experts and thinks we will not notice that he knows absolutely nothing about his subject.

    • educationmatters says:

      You are so right. Tell me why is Ms Rivers and he so intent on ignoring the experts on island. Why do the current inspectors from inspecting our schools from the UK not allowed to talk to people in either the Education Department or the Ministry? Why choose inspectors from the UK with absolutely no experience of state education? So no only do we have a Minister and deputy with no experience of education but we also have inspectors with no experience of state schools or the local context. BECAUSE THEY HAVE AN AGENDA AND THEY WANT THE REPORTS TO BACK UP THEIR IGNORANT BELIEFS.

  3. fred says:

    Interview transcript just in:
    Julianna, why did you spend so much money on hotels, accommodation, per diems, accommodation and travel for you and your minder, and other fruitless excesses which you would never had spent had the funds been coming from your own purse?

    “Because I could, and no one would hold me accountable.”

    Did you consider it necessary, moral, or even ethical to run up such bills?

    (silence …………………………………………………………………………………………)

    Did the country benefit from any of this in any way whatsoever?

    (silence …………………………………………………………………………………………)

    Have you anything at all to say to those people who accuse you of wasting the nations money, and advancing your own personal and political ends at the people’s expense?

    (silence …………………………………………………………………………………………)
    Will you be running for re-election next year?
    “oh yes”

  4. Ziggy says:

    She is now PPM,

  5. Pee King Luck says:

    Nothing is ever going to happen to the “chosen few”. The path is very very easy support and promote mother and her hidden agenda and underlings or face the full wrath of the wicked institutions under her control. Passivity is the same as defending injustice! Confucius say:-Those who ride in Cook car to see Big Cheese at big white castle, get big break from the Law.

  6. SSM345 says:

    Absolute BS.

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