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Contact:
Virnet St. Omer-Fontenelle
Monday, April 5, 2004 – Prime Minister, Dr Kenny Anthony has welcomed
support from both the government and opposition sides of the House of Assembly
for the passage of the Waste Management Bill last Tuesday, March 30, 2004. The
Bill, presented by Minister of Agriculture, Ignatius Jean received overwhelming
approval, with members agreeing on the importance of legislation to protect the
environment.
In supporting the Bill, Dr Anthony said that it highlighted a greater issue of
how the government was managing to finance solid waste management, pointing out
that despite what was already in place, there was a lot more work to be done by
the Saint Lucia Solid Waste Management Authority to assure the protection of the
environment.
The Prime Minister says the Authority had one significant financing tool for
environment protection, citing it as “the much criticised environmental levy”.
“If Saint Lucians want to know where the funds from the levy are going, it is
going to fund the work of the Solid Waste Management Authority”, Dr. Anthony
said.
He says the opposition is critical of the levy and has therefore, called on them
to be explicit about how to finance solid waste management. “The opposition has
said publicly that one of the taxes that it has problems with is the
environmental levy. They really owe it to the public to explain how they are
going to fund environmental protection, if they decide to repeal the
environmental levy.” Dr Anthony said.
The Waste Management Bill was one of three other bills passed when the house
closed the last session for the 2003-2004 fiscal year.
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