Panton: PPM misled public over Dart dump deal
(CNS): Premier Wayne Panton took aim at the PPM on Monday, saying the previous administration misled the public about the waste-management deal it signed with the Dart Group just weeks before the 2021 election. The PACT leader said that far from presenting a negotiated agreement, they signed “an agreement to make an agreement”. Panton said they had left many areas still to negotiate, and the “sheer number of issues left” that needed to be sorted before there could be a financial close came as a surprise.
In a statement to the parliament on the current state of the Integrated Solid Waste Management System (ReGen project), he said that even recently, major omissions have emerged that have had to be addressed, illustrating how this was never a deal that was ready to move to construction when it was signed in March 2021, as the opposition has tried to claim.
Panton said that despite the many challenges, steady progress is being made towards a financial close, which is expected to happen next month. He said that the capping and remediation of the main mound at the George Town Landfill was nearing completion and work on the environmental impact assessment has now begun.
He said that while credit was due to the previous administration for their efforts in the project negotiations with Dart, the contract they signed ahead of the snap election was a long way from a done deal.
“The opposition has not painted an accurate picture when it comes to the level of work that remained to be done after their administration signed that agreement, amid much fanfare and self-congratulation, less than three weeks before the General Election in 2021,” Panton said.
“While there have been suggestions from the opposition that our PACT Government inherited a project where the negotiations were essentially completed and we just needed to get on with construction of the project, I want to make it absolutely clear that this simply was not the case,” the premier stated.
He said that “nothing could be further from the truth” and he was “surprised to discover just how many conditions precedent there were in the signed project agreement and the sheer number of issues, many of which were very significant and complex, that had been left to be negotiated”.
He said that in August 2021 the government’s legal advisors “shared a report that gave an overview of the outstanding items to financial close, the vast majority of which were showing as ‘not yet agreed’ and were significant issues to be addressed”. The report, he said, was 39 pages of outstanding issues.
Panton said that since taking over the project he has had to do a great deal of work to better understand how the project has changed since the deal was first announced five years ago and ensure it continues to meet the country’s needs.
The Office of the Auditor General, which was asked to review the project and provide initial insights as it stood when the project agreement was signed, found that it did not represent value for money and identified opportunities to address and try to mitigate this as the negotiations are being finalised.
“We are committed to taking every step that we can to address this concern and ensure that this incredibly important, and much-needed national project is a value-for-money proposition for the country, and meets our needs now and into the future,” he said.
The project is estimated to cost well in excess of $200 million. Once the project becomes operational, the government will pay a per ton unitary charge for the consortium to process the waste. “We expect the operational costs will also be partially offset by the sale of electricity generated by the waste-to-energy plant,” Panton said.
Negotiations are ongoing and proceeding at pace, Panton told parliament, adding that every effort was being made to ensure that the government achieves value for money. He promised further updates, but in the interim, he urged people to rethink their attitudes to waste, and to recycle and reduce the amount of waste they produce in the first place.
“We should all be rethinking what we consume, reducing what we throw away, reusing items wherever possible and recycling our glass, aluminium, and 1 and 2 plastics at the depots provided and serviced by the team at DEH,” he said.
“Reducing the waste we generate in the first instance, followed by reusing and recycling, are some of the most important tools we have to manage waste more sustainably now and going forward. We have to facilitate a paradigm shift in these islands that takes us back to the mindset previous generations embodied without necessarily realising it.”
Panton said that in the past everything that could be reused was because material possessions were few and far between and they were not taken for granted. He urged members of the public to be part of the solution, not the problem, and to take up the challenge of rethinking waste.
See Panton’s full speech below:
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Category: Environmental Health, Health, Policy, Politics
Wayne obviously has trouble reading the disclaimer on the “compostable” products the food service providers are now charging the consumers more for.
When you say you building that industrial composting facility Wayne?
So if you knew all of this why you waited until now to tell us.? Anyway this fiasco with Mac/PPM /PASK of wolves has given him a little push.
So you knew all of this from August 2921 and you just mentioning it now.
Hold on now Wayne. I know you think you’re smarter than the average Caymanian but that contract the PPM govt signed expired in September of 2021!!! Any contracts signed after that are on you. The PPM signed that contract so that whatever govt got in would then decide the project moving forward. You ofc have kicked the can down the road some more so ofc it’s going to cost more. Talk the truth and stop spreading propaganda to try to make you’re govt look good. Useless! Sign the damn contract and get on with the business, more than a year has passed and you’re still giving people lip service!
If Ian hit Grand Cayman as it hit SWFL, beating it for 9 hours straight, finishing with an unprecedented storm surge, there would be no Dump left…. turning the rock into an unrecoverable waste land.
You obviously were not here for Ivan. That storm beat the Island for almost two days. Everyone thought the Island would not recover, but look at us now.
What size was the Dump in 2004?
Millions of dead animals, hazardous, medical, pharmaceutical and radioactive waste, toxic metals from electronics and machineries WERE NOT in the (2004) quantities it is now.
Re 12/10/2022 @2.55pm
Dead animals, medical and pharmaceutical and radio active waste have never been put in the landfill. In fact after Ivan the land fill was reduced by several hundred tons of old cars and white metals.
@10:19am Who else can they blame but the PPM? Weren’t they the ones that rushed into this deal with DART right before the last election hoping that it would be the lynchpin to get them re-elected?
If there was any incompetence it was surely on the PPM’s part as PACT was not even elected then.
👎🏻
Random notes:
Is there a study comparing the percentage rate or incidence of cancers here in cayman compared to all other countries that report?
Can we just set fire to the Mountain and let it burn away for a year or 2? I’m sure CIREBA could market the blaze as a stunning and unique fiery view that only can truly be experienced from the 10th floor of your $20million condo soon to sink
Has dr lee seen the dg’s report into him and doctors express yet?
How the f*ck is it ‘Sir’ Alden?
What drugs do the road planners ingest here?
Can I sell motion sickness tablets from a roadside location next to grand Harbour roundabout?
Where did monkey pox go?
Would we notice if cayman airways was sold privately? Would we really care?
Why does the water taste strange?
Is tax avoidance morally sound?
Why don’t we charge 2nd home tax on non-permanent residents?
The random notes is interesting….
Re KX being sold it would initially only be felt by staff at all tiers being made redundant due to a “for profit company” but eventually could be felt by all of us if things were to tank in the US and we all of a sudden noticed a reduction in lift thus no sushi grade fish.
Re the second tax on those purchasing property for the sole purpose of gaining residency well the govt should just make the minimum purchase higher which would be more efficient as it all goes to the same place.
Some good stuff in there!
Panton misled the public when he seized power with his backroom deals.
PPMBOT we see you! 🤣
And now all he is doing is whining cause he cant do the job.
Not in the least surprised that the Dart so-called agreement was full of “to be agreed” items. It’s how everything I’ve seen come out of their negotiation team reads.
And Dart got what he wanted – a capped mound facing his developments.
Everything will go the way the boss wants and don’t yo ever forget it
“And Dart got what he wanted..”
Dart is getting his eturn on investments in many of our MPs, but at OUR $20 MILLION expense.
This is our politicians stealing from us.
How much more $$$ before Caymanians wake up.
If government really cared
they would arrange separate trash collection for recyclables rather than expect people to deliver it to the few collection spots available. But hey, we can’t even arrange on time trash collection.
PACT should really leak/publish the full 40 page TBD agreement signed by PPM. Let the public read what the Auditor General rebuked as “not value for money” and make up their own minds about DART and PPM, once and for all. Let the light shine in. The truth is only commercially sensitive to the loosing party: in this case the people of the Cayman Islands.
The real loosers here are the generation being raised by yours.
looser? haha
PPM claimed the Gov was sleepwalking and two quiet but when the public are told the truth they dont like it! Who would with a record like theirs!
Dart had PPM in their pockets.
Dart HAS PPM in their pockets.
Fixed it for you.
Wasn’t the ‘Rise of DART” was by way of McKeeva Bush (Fmr. House Speaker, Fmr. Premier & Leader of the UDP Party)? However, DART’s reach has since spread to both UDP & PPM Parties–Yes?
May I refresh ya memory 3:07 pm, yes the negotiations with dart and others started with MC bush, but less you forget the slimes ppm as soon a they got in went on blended knee to Dart and paid abeyance to the Dart kingdom. That is a fact jack.
Dart has the Cayman Islands in his pocket.
but not all its PEOPLE
Well, Cayman is not capable of governing itself. So if you own and have invested as much as Dart has – you better be able to influence it’s direction. Sorry, but this is common sense.
The Cayman Islands Government paid for roadmap study setting out options for dealing with solid waste in 1989. No one in CIG around at that time seems to know what happened to 7 copies of this voluminous document. Most likely it’s in the dump?
Skipping over subsequent years of apathy and complete ignorance over further study recommendations Dart breaks ground on the International School. This was a foot in the door. CIG’s fiddling and deferral over a solid waste solution is his opportunity.
Now the Regen solution is so complex that the previous party in power couldn’t comprehend it, let alone negotiate any contract for it. Rather they agreed to agree to move forward whilst not understanding what they agreed to. The details were swept under the rug again. It was just opportunity to take credit and glory for endorsing
The people of the Cayman Islands own this mess whether or not it sits well with them. They created the waste and the eligible ones elected the delinquent politicians that ignored dealing with it. Solid waste was never a priority issue on the ballot until recently, this speaks of public ignorance. Ignorance is bliss! But when you’re generating waste for decades and don’t care where it goes, don’t want it in your backyard, don’t want to pay to properly deal with it and finally don’t vote for responsible leaders and hold them accountable this is what you get. And what Premier eluded to in a roundabout way is that we all must now consider that when we outright trash everything we throw away we will be paying to Regen it.
Be thankful a solution is even on the table even if it’s not a centrepiece yet. If you make waste own where it goes. Divert what you can from your trash bag or you will eventually end up paying for it one way or another. Expect CIG to fund Regen waste disposal through the usual means, stamp duty, import duty, disposal and recycling fees etc. Be certain that mindsets must change. Consider someone has to make what you purchase, the cost of disposal of the part you don’t consume is not paid for. Most goods don’t have disposal fees built into their price as yet but that’s coming next.
Wayne got bigger things on his plate right now both metaphorically and, judging by his waistline, literally, than worrying about recycling your Popeye box.
He fighting skullduggery in the ranks!
#5 PP is a common household product container, not just styrofoam. #4 LDPE and #3 PVC also common. Most of us also drink our water via miles of toxic PVC plastic pipe, some of it predating potable safety code. Entire apartment complexes filled with asbestos, decayed pvc, and other toxin fuel are torn down, trucked and piled unsorted onto the dump. Then we wonder aloud why the reef is bleaching; how we lived healthy, and still got cancer…
Could pay for the whole thing with the historic outstanding garbage fees from Caymanian families of old.
PACT please advise when single-use plastics and styrofoam will be banned in the Cayman Islands. This achievement should be a “low-hanging fruit” for this administration which purports to focus heavily on sustainability, the environment, and climate change…so what’s the hold-up?
Remember who invented stryrofoam and invested the proceeds in buying his own capitalist island. What irony!
He did not invent the brand Styrofoam (expanded polystyrene foam) try McIntire circa 1944. Dart just invented processes to mold it into containers. And proceeds from his container businesses pail in comparison to his financial exploits.
All credit to him for his financial investments, at least those in the public domain, whilst still huge by any normal metrics are a fraction of what the family business is said to be worth.
Ah great. I feel much better now when I see it floating around the oceans or washing ashore.
If it makes you sleep better at night Dart employee.
Wasn’t Dart that invented it – and he left the container s business decades ago. Plenty of other things to have a go at him on instead of rebroadcasting this nonsense.
don’t blame the inventer…blame the user and how they dispose of the product. do you blame car makers for air pollution?
Btw, you can’t say “low-hanging fruit” anymore you boomer dinosaur.
Snowflake Woke Boy has entered the chat.
Need to add artificial grass to that list. It’s a toxic waste hazard for the future and a sterile fossil-fuel made wasteland now.
Banning single-use plastics makes it harder for those to purchase and use due to a disability or for a medical need.
Banning plastics will destroy peoples lives. The cost for alternatives do not fit the budget of all the imported labor living off corner restaurants.
Go back home with your WOKE crap.
When we will have roadside recycling collection? More people will recycling that way. Wyane you need start recycling at the public dump waste.
House owners don’t even pay for household waste collection. It’s free, underwritten by strata and business collections fees, all of whom aren’t required to recycle.
11:51am, house hold garbage collection are NOT free. 2 % was added on to import duties years ago for house hold garbage colection, because most people would not pay the garbage fee. You are probably one that wouldn’t pay that’s why you say its free.
when will you people realize that recycling is a scam.
There is no recycling in Cayman except for a minuscule fraction of glass. Everything else is just waste segregation, consolidation and export for recycling overseas. Then again it’s more profitable to just incinerate the plastics and waste oil in facilities that use energy recovery overseas. Reuse of plastics requires far more energy to wash, sort and pelletise than incineration. This is why some see it as a scam.
Stop being lazy, you can recycle now, it’s not that hard and it DOES make a huge impact on how much actually goes into the trash.
mount thrashmore…the prefect monument to the failures and incompetence of caymanian mla’s and the civil service over the last 30 years.
what is ‘a financial close’?
conclusion of the financial transaction
not what google says…
What’s a “google”?
PPM learned the “art” of misinformation from their hero master, Donald Trump.
Unfortunately for us SIR Alden also learned from him destructive growth, growth, growth, destroy, destroy the environment to benefit the few with overdevelopment and overpopulation.
This has made the Cayman Islands too expensive for Generational Caymanians to live.
SIR Alden threw the PPM Leader, The Hon D. Kurt Tibbetts “under the bus when he tried to draft a proper Development Plan in the 2005 to 2009 PPM Government and again in the 2013 to 2017 PPM led coalition Government.
Thank you Hon D. Kurt Tibbetts for attempting since 2001 to draft a proper Development Plan. our Islands would have avoided many of today’s problems.
PPM was always working against you and your fellow PPM MLAs worked only for the rich developers.
When the Hon Wayne Panton worked diligently to draft the decades long-time needed National Conservation Law and then successfully saw a very weakened version enacted, it was evident SIR Alden always worked against any environmental protection.
After the Hon Wayne Panton was not elected in 2017, SIR Alden immediately showed his true colors when he vociferously spoke against the Hon Wayne Panton and the National Conservation Law because it limited environmental destruction SIR Alden had committed, to those who controlled him, would be allowed to proceed forthwith.
PPM / Progressives controlled by SIR Alden does not work for the benefit of Generational Caymanians.
The PPM, like the Hon Mckeeva Bush, have been selling out the future of future Generational Caymanians by changing laws to allow the wholesale addition by the thousands of Paper Caymanians who have no family or marriage connections to our Islands.
Now SIR Alden’s PPM is working full time to break up the group of MPs who came together to form the PACT Government.
PACT MPs. the reasons to stay together for the long term benefit of Generational Caymanians, your decendents, are much greater than any short term individual benefit you may gain by going with SIR Alden’s PPM.
PACT MPs PLEASE CONSIDER THESE THOUGHTS.
Trump wasn’t in power for most of Sir Alden’s tenure, or do you mean during the Apprentice? Cos that’s not real dude
10:56pm, you must be a Western European Liberal!
18 months in and still trying to blame the previous government – poor excuse for incompetence.
PPM signed the deal, committing PACT to their blank document.
Rethinking waste and managing our population and overdevelopment go hand in hand Mr Panton Not one of you Greedy political scions who sit in our Legislative Assembly ever explain or discuss why People Can no longer live or retire in this little place and all YOU elected Bast@#$% are doing is allowing more Corruption, more criminals and more poverty to be imported .That is the s%@! You all need to be discussing and taking action against instead of constantly wrowing and doing absolutely nothing about this terrible Bulls$#@% going on here in Cayman.
No one to blame but “unna” and that includes yourself too. The morons who created the mess which will cost more than 350-450 million when the dust settles were born a raised in unna’s land. And guess who elected them? Unna. Here’s looking at you unna because unna were and are part of the problem, now own it!
One of many things PPM misled the Cayman public about. Not going to be the last.
Another AG report that confirms the legacy of ppm highlighting who they really work for
On the bright side, we now have (almost anyways) an iconic hill (mound). If we can keep on dumping we can rise above the disaster of sea level rise.
Another year, another set of excuses.
ha ha ha…good ol ppm….i looking mars or pluto…as when politicians done with this country…uuufff
Wayne your worthless, – grasping at well needed distraction. What are McBeaters thoughts ?
So gov gonna let the owners of cuc do this project then pay them back. Will there be a monopoly also or can other private firms come in and do the same thing?
So cuc creates electricity for us with petro fuels now we gonna sell our waste to them so they can sell the electricity back to us and we gonna pay for their plant.
After we just got them a new battery system for their solar panels.
Correct me if I am wrong, but that doesn’t sound like a good idea.
CUC won’t own this plant – it’s always been the position in these agreements that Dart will own it and sell power to the grid, much like the solar farm in Bodden Town, which is currently owned by one of Richard Branson’s companies.
Where do we put styrofoam for recycling please?
Why do you use it in the first place?
Don’t be rude. Sometimes it comes in internal packaging, and one doesn’t have a clue it’s there until one opens the package
I have no idea what to do with it, sorry.
Perhaps we can give it all back to the Dart family since they are the great inventors of it!
And where did you find that Dart invented styrofoam?
Fake google.
you’re all loosers & jokers!!
loosers?
Yes. As I understand 9:10, we are all (most of us) quite flaccid in our persecution of the ebildooers (loosers), however, we’re also just occasionally funny (jokers).
So the complaint is: “Government is being forced to do some work”
Jokers.
Another key PPM project has resulted in another bad deal for Cayman. All will finally come to light about the dump project and why they rushed to sign a deal
The Premier is a complete buffoon and way out of his depth here. He was anything but a stellar lawyer and should not pretend to be the expert in negotiating Any sort of deal.
Well now he has to because PPM were so inept they signed an empty deal. PACT should void what amounts to a ReGen MOU, and engage with a whole planet of accredited garbage expertise companies. None of which are called DART.
Yawn. Fix the damn dump Wayne.
If we banned single use plastics, styrofoam, and most of the over-packaged crap we import, it’d go a long wait to helping.
If we can only recycle 1 and 2, stipulate we must import X% of products that use it.
So why were you trying to get back with them Wayne?
so says alden? He would have you believe everybody has come to them! Good reasons not to believe that!
Alden wouldn’t say it if there was a chance Wayne could deny it. I ran into Jon Jon right before the Mac fiasco and he told me it was just a matter of time before we had a new Government. In his words “just wait for it”
Alden said that about Wayne..That should tell you how much faith you should put into that..he didn’t need to call a press conference to say that about Wayne. He did so because he knew that the press would pick it up and some fools would take it for gospel.
Alden is like Trump. He knows if he keeps saying it, enough of his die-hard followers will believe it and spread it around to cause dissension.
I will believe the PPM’s version until WP holds another press conference to deny it. I dare him to. I don’t understand why Jon-Jon was celebrating about it because the PPm was not taking him onboard.
Please! Accept that Wayne had to come snooping around PPM trying to undo what he realized was his biggest mistake so far; he can’t deny it. PPM does not need Wayne Panton and his croonies do not want him – the amount of disrespect they have thrown at Wayne, why wouldn’t he be looking to offload them!
you seem to have a hard on for Trump. you like senile joe better?
I remember when a previous PPM regime under Tibbetts was balking at remediating and lining the GT landfill because it might cost as much as $10mln and they didn’t have the money or ambition to tackle it.
PPM also failed to supervise compliance with the NRA Agreement. Hundreds of millions in public losses there. DART execs laugh and roll their eyes about how dumb our CIG leadership are that they actually sign carte blanche agreements. Dart have no waste management experience to sell! Duh!