ADDRESS BY
THE RT. HON. OWEN ARTHUR
PRIME MINISTER

AT THE OFFICIAL OPENING OF
HARAMBEE HOUSE

THE GARRISON
ST. MICHAEL

April 7, 2006

I am very pleased this morning to be able to lend the full support and prestige of the Office of the Prime Minister of Barbados to this simple but significant ceremony which, physically, is about the opening of a Centre, but symbolically is about the opening of a new source of hope and inspiration not only for the community of the disabled, but for all of us.

Barbados is a good society.

Our strength lies not only in the size and extent of our gross Domestic Product and our per capita income, though they are important.

It is to be found not only in the extent of our foreign exchange reserves, although they too are important and happily in recent weeks have started once again to significantly increase.

The goodness of our society does not truly reside in the very many important and impressive large investments and projects that are being executed to build a more modern economy and infrastructure, and to increase our national wealth and output.

In the very best sense, the richness of our Barbadian society is mostly reflected in the very many things we have managed to do over the course of our development to make life better for those who do not have enough, to lend a helping had to our citizens in desperate need, and to offer new, productive opportunity to those who for whatever reason have found themselves on the margins of economic and social life in our nation.

This empathic and civilised approach to development did not start with this Administration.

But I count among the most significant achievement of the last decade not so much the extraordinary achievements on the economic front, but the very many meaningful initiatives we have taken as a Government to make life better for those in society who need the helping had of Government - persons living with HIV/AIDS, children at risk, the boys on the block, small contractors who look to the UDC and Government agencies for work, the homeless, our pensioners and our senior citizens.

Our society is at its best when it reaches out to actively take care of minorities within its midst.  And this is especially true when such minority groups include individuals who face stigma and discrimination for whatever reason or who are perceived to be incapable of making any significant contribution to society or to their own development.

This ceremony this morning therefore assumes a significance that goes way beyond the mere opening of a Centre.

It signifies a collective determination by all of us to bring within the mainstream of our national life another minority group that for too long has had to endure stigma and discrimination and has had to hurdle seemingly insurmountable obstacles in the course of its members’ efforts to realise their full potential and worth as people.

The completion of this building marks the culmination of a long and arduous road travelled by the Barbados Council for the Disabled in pursuit of its dream of occupying its own home.

The Council would have gratefully received help from Government agencies and institutions of civil society along the way.

But what has been achieved here in the form of the construction of this new centre is the triumph of the spirit of the members of our community living with disabilities to demand what is rightfully yours - namely the right of access to facilities to enable them to live the kind of productive and dignified lives which all other Barbadians expect.

Persons living with special needs constitute a significant percentage of our population.  Data from the 2000 Population Census indicates that 13,142 persons or 5% of the total population of Barbados were physically or mentally challenged or suffered from hearing or visual impairment.

This figure probably under-represented the true situation given the tendency of some, historically, to secret away disable relatives.

Happily, with the possibility of increasing access to special need services, such acts of denial are now on the decline.

In addition, the prevalence of individual success stories has increased awareness that persons with disabilities can make meaningful contributions, and stand ready to take their rightful place in society.

It is, however, important that the entire Barbadian society acknowledges that treating to the needs of the disabled is a collective rather than an individual social responsibility.

For too long, the focus has been placed on the disability rather than the person, perpetuating highly negative perceptions of deficiency, inferiority, incompleteness and abnormality.

And yet, the concept of “disabled” is one that is not necessary fixed at birth nor is static.  Many are included in the category as a result of vehicle accidents, exposures to viruses, degeneration or genetic diseases and even the process of ageing.

Indeed, any one of us could find ourselves included at some stage in our lives, among the community of the disabled.

 Against such a background I am happy that already there is a noticeable change in the societal attitudes towards persons with disabilities.  This has been the result of the work if organisations such as yours as well as that of parents and friends of the community of persons with disabilities, who have worked tirelessly to raise the public awareness and the expectations of persons with disabilities.

You have chosen the approach of helping yourself and have not come to the table, like the mendicant, seeking alms or expecting others to romanticize your poverty.   Rather you request partnerships which can add value to your efforts as indeed most other groups in society do.

This approach is very much to be commended and emulated by other groups in the society.

On the occasion of the launch of the construction project some months ago I had the opportunity to commend you on the choice of name for this Harambee building.  Indeed, as a coordinating body for persons with disabilities, the measure of your success will depend on your ability to “work together” and to collaborate with public and private sector bodies having similar interests, both within and outside the community of the disabled.

The work of this Council over 30 years have so far succeeded in empowering a group of citizens who would otherwise have been forced to survive an existence of dismal rejection.

Several agencies of Government have assisted you along the difficult path you have had to travel.  As regards the construction of this Centre in particular, the contribution of the Ministry of Social Transformation, the Ministry of Public Works, the Town Planning Department, the Government Electrical Department, to name but a few, is worthy of commendation.

Structural Systems, the many other private sector companies and the many individuals who contributed to the construction of this Centre also deserve special public praise and acknowledgment.

But in the final analysis the construction of this Centre has been realised because you have remained champions of your own cause.

Do not allow yourselves ever to be ignored.

This morning I bring you the message that the Government of Barbados fully supports your effort and pledges to continue its initiatives to ensure that persons with disabilities can live productive lives in conditions of dignity.

One of the most important ways that the Government can assist is by removing the spectre of financial uncertainty that has always hung over the affairs of this Council.

As a result, the subvention to the Council in this year’s Estimates of Expenditure has been increased to over $325,000 to meet the full operating cost of running the administrative affairs of this Centre.

Government will, in each succeeding year, meet the full cost of operating this Centre.

I wish today to reiterate the commitment I gave to Parliament in January to increase each year the benefits paid to persons living with disabilities to ensure that as soon as possible no one receives payments from the Government that puts them below the poverty line.

This however should not deter members of the public nor institutions from continuing to make financial contributions, as they have done in the past, to support the work of the Council.

Rather, such contributions should be maintained to create a pool of resources to enable the Council to expand the scope of the developmental programmes its sponsors for the benefit of its community.

The point in all of this is that the Government of Barbados is not interested only in the construction of buildings but also in the provision of the resources and the creation of partnerships to ensure that the use for which the building is intended can be meaningfully pursued.  This building should be developed into a fully equipped resource centre to which members of the community would enjoy visiting and for which they would feel a binding association.

My Government pledges to assist the Council in achieving this goal.

On another matter of special interest, the Ministry of Social Transformation, in collaboration with the Ministry of Labour is in the process of developing an Employment Policy for the Disabled.  This is in keeping with Convention 159 of the International Labour Organisation on vocational Rehabilitation and Employment (Disabled Persons).  The Convention defines a disabled person as “an individual whose prospects of securing, retaining and advancing in suitable employment are substantially reduced as a result of a duly recognised physical or mental impairment”.

Available data has revealed that only approximately 5% of employers in Barbados employ persons with disabilities.  Many of these employers are now convinced of the economic value of persons with disabilities, based on their work performance.  Persons with disabilities must therefore be afforded the opportunity to prove themselves and be enabled to compete on a level playing field, free from discrimination and exploitation.

Positive and sustainable change will however depend largely on our social conscience, the application of relevant international standards and our collective effort.  It will also require sustained engagement by the community of persons living with disabilities.       

You demonstrated your collective power when you agitated successfully and positively influenced the content of the white Paper on Persons with Disabilities.  That Paper is shaping and will continue to shape Government’s policy for the Disabled.
The collective responsibility of the Barbadian society in dealing with Persons with Disabilities then, is to focus on persons, compensate for any impairments, and remove the existing social and environmental barriers to their full and rewarding participation.

Mr. Chairman it is this that gives me great pleasure to declare the new home and Resource Centre of the Barbados Council for the Disabled officially open.  I trust that you will be happy here, that you will create good and lasting memories, and continue to touch the lives of members of your community in a most positive and productive manner.

As I open this building I think of the words of Ruskin, which I have previously used elsewhere, but which have a more imposing relevance today:

“When we build let us build such a work as our descendants will thank us for; and let us think as we lay stone on stone, that a time is to come when those stones will be held sacred because our hands have touched them, and that men will say as they look upon them, “see this our fathers did for us”.