LONDON: Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (UK) David Cameron announced a package of British investments in its former Caribbean colonies as he sought regional support for his plan to boost his country’s exports.
Cameron admitted in a speech to a joint sitting of both Houses of Jamaica’s Parliament, at Gordon House, that his Government’s target is to boost UK exports around the world, including the Caribbean, to £1 trillion by 2020.
“Every country in the world needs to seek out new sources of trade, investment, and growth…That’s why I have visited far-flung destinations across the world to bang the drum for British business and boost trade,” he told to the Jamaican Parliament.
“My Government set a bold target of exporting £1 trillion by 2020. To achieve this, we need to build markets worldwide, and that must include here, in the Caribbean,” he stated.
Cameron offered some £360 million in new financial commitments to the region, which he pointed out were not soft loans but cash grants.
The commitments included £30 million for new programmes to attract investments and improve governance across the region, £30 million to help make regional hospitals more resilient to natural disasters, and £25 million to build a new prison in Jamaica, which will house Jamaicans imprisoned in the UK for various crimes.
He said that UK Export Finance is being geared to boost its support for the region and help British exporters to sell to the Caribbean with confidence.
But, though Cameron’s bag of goodies seemed too tempting for Jamaica’s depressed economy to ignore, the UK prime minister must have left Jamaica yesterday with a bittersweet feeling as to whether he had convinced the local parliamentarians of his openness, in light of the controversy raised by his failure to apologise for Britain’s role in the African slave trade and his proposal to contribute £25 million to building a new prison.
Leader of the Opposition, Andrew Holness, dismissed the idea of a £25 million contribution to a new state-of- the-art prison with disdain. He also suggested that Cameron ought to have paid more attention to the calls for a response to the reparation claims.
“The key lesson here is that educating our people, especially as it relates to skills training, is the best way to spur human development, support a growth agenda, and keep them out of prison. Indeed, schools contribute more to economic growth and human development than do prisons,” Holness said in an obvious response to the proposal.
Turning to the calls for an apology and reparations for African slavery, which has been led by Opposition MP Mike Henry, Holness said that his Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) believes that the wrongs of the past cannot be ignored.
“We appreciate the view expressed that our relationship should be forward looking. Nevertheless, I also believe that there must be genuine commitment to finding ways of repairing what is universally agreed to be the wrongs of the past,” Holness said.
However, he insisted that Jamaica should take note of the recovery of the British economy.
“It is a lesson to the world, and particularly Jamaica, that it is possible to advance an agenda of fiscal discipline and grow the economy at the same time,” Holness said.
Prime Minister Portia Simpson Simpson Miller welcomed Cameron’s decision to change the provisions of the UK’s Air Passenger Duty rules and remove the penalties affecting people travelling to and from the Caribbean.
Prime Minister Simpson Miller said that she had discussed the “difficult” issue of reparations with Cameron, and the actions being contemplated under the auspices of the Caribbean Community.
However, she said that Jamaica is committed to “a spirit of mutual respect, openness and understanding” as it seeks to engage the UK on the matter.
“At the same time, we remain unshaken in our conviction that there is more that unites us as peoples and Governments, of the UK and Jamaica, than separates us,” Simpson Miller said.
Cameron, who arrived in Jamaica on Tuesday afternoon, left the island yesterday morning at 10:00 for Grenada, where he was expected to seek more support for his plans.
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