Dis­sat­is­fied with bu­reau­crat­ic de­lays hin­der­ing the $4 bil­lion La Brea Dry Dock­ing Fa­cil­i­ty, Prime Min­is­ter Stu­art Young has pledged that a re-elect­ed Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM) gov­ern­ment will es­tab­lish a Min­istry of Im­ple­men­ta­tion and Ef­fi­cien­cy to ac­cel­er­ate state projects.

At the 2018 sign­ing of a co­op­er­a­tive agree­ment be­tween Gov­ern­ment and the Chi­na Har­bour En­gi­neer­ing Com­pa­ny Ltd, for­mer prime min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley had promised the fa­cil­i­ty would pro­vide jobs for re­trenched Petrotrin work­ers. How­ev­er, many are still wait­ing for the 5,000 jobs pledged.

Speak­ing at the open­ing of the new La Brea Com­mu­ni­ty Cen­tre and the sod-turn­ing for the La Brea En­hance­ment Project yes­ter­day, Young as­sured that work on the fa­cil­i­ty con­tin­ues, with en­vi­ron­men­tal stud­ies un­der­way. How­ev­er, he be­lieves the En­vi­ron­men­tal Man­age­ment Au­thor­i­ty (EMA) is tak­ing too long to is­sue the Cer­tifi­cate of En­vi­ron­men­tal Clear­ance. As a lawyer, he said he con­sid­ers how to re­view and amend the law to bal­ance en­vi­ron­men­tal pro­tec­tion with na­tion­al progress.