I wouldnt necessarily say the hotels are *jealous*. But I believe your theory is correct. They've complained publicly many times about the taxes they have to pay but vacation rentals dont. But It's not a matter of jealousy, its business, they see revenue bleeding because of the presence of a competitor and they see that competitor having an unfair advantage. I think it's a skewed view, because while vacation rentals did not pay VAT they as also dont get the import concessions hotels do, they dont get to run up massive electricity bills.

I dont think the vacation rental market isnt all good either. I just dont like the way govt rushes in with surface level enthusiasm either way. I do remember the govt pushing many campaigns to encourage Bahamians to get into the sector partnering with airbnb to list properties etc. But again it's a total misunderstanding of economic tradeoffs because what did that do? It sent domestic rental prices through the roof, it cut the domestic rental inventory dramatically. I'm not saying it's bad I'm just saying our govt does too many things led by mediocre MPs with very little analysis.

Now they're going after agriculture, which is great but I wonder if in the process if they will destroy real farmers and end up with opportunists running farms for profit but very little farming intelligence. Same as happened with payment providers and Sand dollar.

Well... it een working from the inside so... (I say that in jest)

"***only $4m in fee income was collected by Seaz Pass during the 16 months it was operational**. Mr Maury, who revealed that all parties including the ABM, Ministry of Finance and Omni, received weekly statements showing how much was collected from the portal, said he - like Tribune Business - had also been informed by the payments provider of its position that zero monies are owed to the Government.*"

*Mr Wilson, though, confirmed that “the primary reason” **the Government demanded Seaz Pass’s closure** was its belief that paid fee income was not being handed over. “Omni never remitted the funds to the Treasury. We’re trying to negotiate with them. So far we are down, **based on our calculations, over $5m**,” the financial secretary told this newspaper.*

**Can the parties please stop playing games?** Theres a report with all the vessels coming in. Theres a standard fee per vessel type. Theres a bank wire of funds going to the treasury. **Since the PM made a public accusation the public is due a reconciliation report from the ministry of finance.**

**Barring the govt being responsible and producing a reconciliation report, if the parties value their good name, they'd publish their own report**

"*Businessman Bruce Raine, who told Tribune Business he decided to quit the sector after it became clear the former Minnis administration was targeting it for extra revenue*"

Good idea, every govt that's come to power in the last 15 years seems set on gobbling up any lucrative sector of the economy before it even has a chance to get out of infancy. Its like they have very little understanding of or appreciation for economic trade offs. They just see plus signs

*1 in 10* doesnt give an accurate description. That's only 4 people. It would be better to hear about the quality of the disclosures and possibly an auditing of a randomly selected set of the disclosures by various weight classes like budget of the ministry, length of time in parliament. And start with what these disclosures are supposed to do, so trending assets vs salary. That would give us better quality information. Pray for the day we have a PM who actually hold their party to that standard

And to be fair to the MPs the process is invasive. Noone probably enjoys it, noone would like it, but it's a necessary part of being granted power over billions of dollars of public funds and contracts. Theres probably a need for better training of everyone who gets it in their head that they could be an MP because they love the country and they want to help or they look good in a suit, this is a tough job and not many of them are prepared for it, have the mental capacity to handle it or the service mindset.

Isnt this always the case. The IDB needs to give us the 30 year breakdown of how much money they lent us and which objectives were actually ever met

So last week Dr Sands sounded the alarm about an unusual rise in respiratory cases at the hospital. Dr Darvile said then that he dont know what Dr Sands talking about. Now today Dr Darville says theres an unusual rise in post COVID cases. When will public health be about the public and not some political gamesmanship? Its not like this magically started after Dr Sands made his statement. This situation had to exist at the very time Dr Darville was telling the nation everything was fine, nothing out of the ordinary to be concerned about.

It cannot be that Maury says he has records of all transaction, OMNI says they submitted everything collected and the Govt says 5m is outstanding.

It seems like Maury and OMNI can clear this up among themselves, what went through the portal by month and class of transport and what was remitted to the govt by month from OMNI

Also how in gods name can they enforce these rules with all the bad roads constant flooding and hidden craters?

While an improved vehicle inspection process is great how did they make this giant leap from that to reducing traffic accidents?

Who are these speech writers??? From the price control who didnt know the difference between products and product categories to the budget writer who didnt understand what a greater than symbol was when comparing numbers and now this speech that makes a claim that wheel alignments will reduce traffic accidents.

I suppose that means people only run red lights, overtake without due care and speed when their wheels aren't properly aligned. **Why didnt they get a report from the police on all traffic accidents in the past 5 years and the causes of those accidents to report on number with wheels not aligned and bad suspension**

This **seems like a money making scam that has no origination in concern for road safety because accidents arent caused by the car they're caused by the driver**