Governor Elizabeth Carriere and Premier Donaldson Romeo
In her first press conference Her Excellency Governor Elizabeth Carriere told a press conference that there are five main areas that she “…will be focusing on.”
H E Excellency Governor Carriere
Her Excellency told the press conference hosted by her with the Hon. Premier Donaldson Romeo, and Mr. Martin Dawson, the DFID resident representative in attendance. The press corps present, Miss Nerissa Golden, Herman Sergeant for ZJB Radio, Mr. Warren Cassell for The Montserrat Reporter with the skyped in attendance of Jeevan Robinson of MNIAlive.com and Bennette Roach, The Montserrat Reporter.
Tony Bates, facilitator for the press conference in the absence of Governor’s press officer Richard Aspin who has reached the end of his contract had has moved into retirement, introduced.
After her welcomes the Governor noted immediately that this was her first press conference having arrived six weeks ago and that it was being held jointly with the Premier, for whom it was also his first press conference for his first year. Governor Carrier announced she wished to say some general things some she had touched on in her acceptance speech, and which she would like to speak of again.
She reminded, “I talked about the importance of partnership and that certainly a thing for myself and I know that the Premier will touch on that as well. I touched on the importance of good governance, the importance of a sustainable economy and the importance of safety and security.”
She observed that she had been six weeks into the job. “I’m certainly not going to pretend to have all the answers that these points raise, and I don’t have all the information either.”
The ‘little’ lady, she being petite in stature said she has, “…learned a lot in these six weeks and I think I’m in a much better position to understand what these questions mean and how some of these are being addressed.”
She moved into speaking about the areas she wished to focus on for the next, saying there are: “five areas, main areas that I will be focusing on.”
She enumerated, “One comes under the general question of how Montserrat can turn the corner from recovery to success on its road to self-sufficiency? So this is all to do with the theme of respecting the past and embracing the future and what comes under that is certainly the economy, infrastructure, investment and so on…”
Two: “the second question is, how can Montserrat be made a safer place to live, to visit and to work? That includes preparedness and response to disasters which all of us has been very much engaged with over the last month, issues around criminality and issues around general safety for Montserratians and visitors.”
Three: “Another key thing for me and I know is very important to Montserratians as well is how can we better protect the young and the vulnerable from neglect and exploitation:”
“Fourth. Another question. How can we better develop the huge potential of Montserrat? I know in my acceptance speech I focused on the importance of people as an essential resource the key resource of Montserrat. So the potential of its people especially is youth, is key part of that answering that question. Certainly, the island’s beauty and its environment and the unique character of this island!”
“And finally, my fifth question is, “how can we better ensure that Montserratians get the quality of service they deserve from their Public Service.”
Her Excellency concluded her saying: “These are the key areas that I’ll be looking at working on in concert with my colleagues in government and my colleagues from the UK Government as well,”
“Those are my introductory remarks,” she said as she invited questions following the Premier’s introduction, inviting him to make his introduction.”
