Senators Criticize Government for Ineffective Business Facilitation Systems: Calls for Immediate Improvements

Two senators on Wednesday lambasted the government for continued failure to improve systems supporting business facilitation.

During debates on the Corporation Top-Up Tax Bill in the Upper House, Opposition Senator Tricia Watson and Independent Senator Andrew Mallalieu urged the Mottley administration to address the inconsistencies and headaches Barbadians routinely face when trying to conduct basic business transactions.

Senator Watson said much-vaunted technologies introduced to streamline processes at various government agencies have brought little improvement for average Barbadians.

“The ease of doing business has not shown any appreciable improvements,” she declared.

“People who are out there doing business every day complain about interacting with our primary business regulators, the lack of speed, the backlogs we are contending with, the introduction of new requirements that also place a burden on those regulatory agencies – Corporate Affairs and Intellectual Property Office [CAIPO]; our banking system; Barbados Revenue Authority; our judicial system; [and] the lack of an effective commercial mediation and alternative resolution system.”

She criticised new government websites meant to reduce wait times, saying they often fail to work properly.

“Portals established for doing government business must work,” she said. “We seem to take the path of least resistance when we implement technological tools for doing government business in Barbados. Those of us who make contact with them regularly are frustrated a lot of the time; when you come, you click on a menu, it drops down, you click on something else and then nothing.”

The opposition lawmaker, a lawyer, highlighted CAIPO’s “new and improved portal” as an example, saying: “Very limited things you can do on it. All of the service providers who have to interact with it are disappointed. We thought it would be easier to do business with CAIPO online [but] many of us have had to resort to the old system to do a lot of our online business.”

She added: “I don’t understand how [the inability to make CAIPO payments via EZ Pay] can go backward. It does not make sense if we are having a complicated business regulation and tax regulation regime, but it is hard for us to do the things we want to do.”

Business executive Senator Mallalieu shared similar concerns, arguing the government must urgently address such inefficiencies, which lead to lost productivity. He highlighted vehicle registration as a particular problem area given the high number of vehicles versus limited registration offices.