Government oversight
Data protection finally implemented
(CNS): After some ten years of discussions and drafting, the Data Protection Law (DPL), which was passed in the Legislation Assembly in 2017, has finally come into force. The law, which is modeled on data protection legislation in the European Union, was implemented on Monday. It is centred around eight data protection principles regarding the […]
Public authorities slip on FOI efficiency
(CNS): As the Office of the Ombudsman prepares to mark the annual Right to Know Day, in the tenth year since the Freedom of Information law was implemented, the office released a report revealing that public authorities are falling behind again when it comes to complying with the legislation. The latest statistics show that last […]
Civil service running up overtime bills
(CNS): The auditor general has noted that government has been running up overtime bills for civil servants across a number of departments, leading to budget overruns, as a result of a number of vacancies across the civil service. In Sue Winspear’s latest report on the state of public finances, the independent auditor warned government that […]
Carter’s pay-off remains secret
(CNS): How much the public purse coughed up to pay off the former director of the Department of Environmental Health, Roydell Carter, will remain a secret, as the Office of the Ombudsman has upheld a decision by government to refuse a freedom of information request made last September. Despite finding that government should not be […]
Miller retakes PAC chair after LA wrangle
(CNS): Government’s attempt to take control of the Public Accounts Committee following the resignation of Ezzard Miller, just as it is embarking on a number of major capital projects, was thwarted Friday when Chris Saunders declined to take up the nomination for chairman. The opposition had accused government of stacking the committee and Saunders refused […]
GTPS makes progress but challenges remain
(CNS): After its third follow-up inspection report last month, George Town Primary School has made enough progress for inspectors to rate the school as ‘satisfactory’ after its previous ratings of weak. In this latest report inspectors said the GTPS had addressed all six of the recommendations made in 2015. The first had been for the […]
Miller steps down from PAC
(CNS): The outgoing opposition leader, Ezzard Miller, has announced his intention to also resign from the chairmanship of the Public Accounts Committee (PAC). Following his resignation last week as the formal opposition leader, he has also decided to step down from one of the most important parliamentary committees regarding government accountability. Miller, who has held […]
Ombudsman upholds 7 of 76 cop complaints
(CNS): The Office of the Ombudsman, the independent body that oversees the investigation of complaints made against the Royal Cayman Islands Police Service, examined 76 cases last year from a backlog of more than 100 complaints and several dozen new cases made during the course of the year. But just 17 of those cases were […]
Schools scrape ‘satisfactory’ grades
(CNS): Judged ‘weak’ in two previous inspections, George Town Primary School was found to have made satisfactory progress in the latest follow-through report. The government school was judged to have made progress in maths after children were previously said to be underachieving. But as the government primary schools struggle to achieve more than satisfactory ratings […]
HRC chair stands ground despite Mac’s rebuke
(CNS): James Austin-Smith has stood by a press release issued by the Human Rights Commission criticising government’s decision to appeal Chief Justice Anthony Smellie’s ruling legalising same-sex marriage. The HRC chairman did not apologise to the Legislative Assembly, despite demands from Speaker McKeeva Bush. In a letter to the speaker, he said that he did […]
Clifton Hunter still ‘weak’, say school inspectors
(CNS): The overall performance of Clifton Hunter High School was rated weak again by education inspectors, showing that the government’s flagship school has shown no improvement since its review last year. In the Office of Education Standards’ latest report on the school in Frank Sound they said the standard of teaching was ‘weak’ and most […]
