The Tribune

By NEIL HARTNELL

Tribune Business Editor

nhartnell@tribunemedia.net

Bahamian contractors yesterday said they have “no idea” what the Government intends to do about proposed legislation to regulate their industry, after making all the changes requested.

Godfrey Forbes, the Bahamian Contractors Association’s (BCA) president, told Tribune Business that the Contractors Bill was now with Deputy Prime Minister Philip Davis, and the industry was waiting to see whether he will take it to Parliament.

The BCA chief questioned why the construction industry was the only professional sector not regulated despite its importance as the “third pillar” of the Bahamian economy.

“The Contractors Bill is still outstanding. We don’t know what’s going on with that,” Mr Forbes told Tribune Business.

“It’s been left in the Deputy Prime Minister’s hands, and we’ll have to see whether he presents it to Parliament. It’s important for them to do that. We’ve made some adjustments we’d been asked to do, and from that point in time, everything’s been quiet.”

Efforts to pass the Contractors Bill have now spanned three administrations, two of PLP vintage and one FNM, yet the legislation appears to be no closer to making it on to a crowded Cabinet agenda and being taken to Parliament.

The Bill, if passed, would introduce a system of licensing and self-regulation, where Bahamian contractors would be certified according to their qualifications and scale/scope of work they are capable of undertaking.

It also includes provisions giving Bahamian consumers means of redress against shoddy workmanship and other frequent complaints made about Bahamian contractors.

Mr Forbes said the construction industry’s overall importance to the Bahamian economy gave efforts to pass the Contractors Bill added urgency.

“It’s unfortunate that we’ve got the construction industry being the number three pillar of our economy, but it’s still not regulated,” he told Tribune Business.

“I don’t know why we’ve not regulated this industry when it plays such a meaningful role in the economic landscape of our country.”

Bahamian contractors received support for their position this week from former parliamentary secretary in the Ministry of Works, Renward Wells, who called on the Government to bring the Contractors Bill to the House of Assembly “with haste”.

Mr Wells, an engineer by profession, said that had the Contractors Bill been in place, the Bahamas Agricultural and Marine Sciences Institute (BAMSI) insurance ‘debacle’ would never have taken place.

“The Contractor’s Bill is the last plank, the last part of closing the circle of licensing the entire built environment in this country,” said Mr Wells.

“The architects are licensed, the engineers are licensed and the next group of persons who must be licensed are the contractors.

“I believe and know that that if the industry was licensed, the BAMSI insurance debacle would not have happened because it would have been a part of the requirements for every licensed contractor to have his or her own insurance, as it is for every architect, as it is for every engineer.”

A 2011 draft of the Contractors Bill, which the BCA has long campaigned for, stipulates that before providing a construction, “a licensed contractor or licensed contracting firm must provide to the client a certificate of insurance, evidencing Contractors All-Risk Insurance and public liability insurance of $1 million”.

Mr Wells’ remarks echoed those of Mr Forbes and his BCA presidential predecessor, Stephen Wrinkle, who told Tribune Business earlier this year that taxpayers would not be exposed to almost $3 million in extra costs as a result of the BAMSI fire if the Government had ended the construction industry’s 15-year wait for legislation to regulate it.

They added that the proposed Contractors Bill would prevent companies from being licensed/registered to legally provide construction services if they did not have Contractors All-Risk Insurance (CAR) in place.

Mr Wells added this week: “I believe that once we would have licensed these contractors and established a local Contracting Board, that that is a panacea for a lot of what ails us in this country.

“With the establishment of a Contractor’s Board, every construction company that seeks to come in would have to get approval from them. We would have economically and politically empowered an entire industry. I look forward to that coming to Parliament so we can vote for it and empower the Bahamian people.”