Tag: Chris Saunders
Premier seeks 8.5% cut to this year’s budget
(CNS): Civil service bosses have been told to cut spending by around $47 million before the end of the year. With just four months left of 2023, Premier Wayne Panton, wearing his finance minister hat, has called on public servants to save cash as operational expenditure climbs toward $1 billion. He told CNS this wasn’t […]
Public cash pays for failed health insurance system
(CNS): With many local people still either uninsured or under-insured, the government’s healthcare bill is climbing while the local health insurance sector continues to make a profit as companies cherrypick their customers. Earlier this month, Cabinet approved another CI$13.5 million of public cash to cover healthcare costs this year for indigents and for those with […]
New pension raid justified by poor performance
(CNS): A proposal to allow people to use their pensions to pay down mortgages or for a deposit to buy their first property is justified because of the poor performance of private pension funds that non-government workers are forced to pay into each month, Chris Saunders MP said in parliament last Friday. Despite some reservations, […]
Minister blames ‘environment’ for planning delays
(CNS): Planning Minister Jay Ebanks pointed the finger at the Department of Environment on Wednesday, maintaining that environmental input was delaying planning applications, though he offered no evidence to support the accusation. That same day, several MPs once again indirectly railed against the National Conservation Law and the environmental impact assessment for the East-West Arterial […]
PACT commits to free health cover for kids and elders
(CNS): The Cayman Islands Government has committed to introducing free healthcare provision for both children and the elderly as soon as it can afford to do so, though it has not given a timeline for when this will happen. In parliament last month, during a debate on a private member’s motion, the government said that […]
Civil servants could get 13% raise over 3 years
(CNS): Chris Saunders (BTW), now an independent MP who sits on the opposition benches, managed to steer through his private member’s motion calling for a significant increase in government workers’ wages last week, something he had sought to support in the budget preparations before he lost his job as finance minister. The government agreed to […]
MPs vote in favour of West Bay high school
(CNS): Almost two decades after then education minister Alden McLaughlin proposed building a new high school in West Bay, the parliament has voted to try again to give the district a school. A private member’s motion presented by veteran West Bay MP McKeeva Bush proposed that Cayman Islands Government start the process to build the […]
Saunders challenges ‘sustainability’ of PACT
(CNS): In his first address to parliament from the opposition benches since being fired from the PACT Cabinet, Chris Saunders (BTW) challenged the sustainability of some of the Cayman Islands Government’s fiscal and political plans. Sustainability has been billed as a major component of this government, but the now estranged independent MP said revenue derived […]
Opposition looks for answers from PACT
(CNS): The PPM has filed eighteen questions for PACT to answer during the next meeting of parliament on topics ranging from the controversial ReGen project to the Deloitte Transport report. They have also tabled two motions, including one to mandate a private schools bus service. Chris Saunders, who will be taking up his new seat […]
PPM leader refutes Panton’s claim over Mac
(CNS): Opposition Leader Roy McTaggart has denied sending any indirect message to Premier Wayne Panton about who should have replaced Dwayne Seymour on the Public Accounts Committee. On Friday, Panton made the controversial nomination of beleaguered MP McKeeva Bush (WBW) and has implied he did so because McTaggart, who chairs PAC, had indicated that he […]
Isaac voted deputy speaker, Mac returns to PAC
(CNS): The PACT Government has again appointed one of its own backbench MPs as deputy speaker of the House of Parliament after Premier Wayne Panton nominated Isaac Rankine (EE). And although Chris Saunders is available to serve on the critical Public Accounts Committee, having been fired from Cabinet, Panton opted to give the vacant seat […]
