Thank you very much Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I'm sure you'll admit after listening to speakers before me that there's not much I can say. I must tell you the member from Viewfort North was simply inspiring and he spoke about being excited about the future and he got me excited. I even forgot that I was the Minister of Tourism who had to speak on the motion. I was really caught up in his presentation and a member from Babuno, South-East, Cassius North, you know Denry. Even a member from Trousel raised a couple of very valuable points and I will touch on a couple of them. Even the Attorney General next to me wanted to stand up and speak, Mr. Speaker. I want to start off, Mr. Speaker, by first of all, thanking the Prime Minister and my colleagues for the support that they have given to this resolution and especially, Mr. Speaker, that they are all wedded in the idea that we have an opportunity in Saint Lucia to transform the tourism industry to bring greater benefits to Saint Lucia like never before. It is a journey, it is a vision that started many years ago and a lot of what I believe in and I reflect on actually started many years ago when the present Prime Minister was the Minister of Tourism and the member from Vuford South himself was Prime Minister. So many of those ideas and approaches came out of a very clear understanding of what tourism should represent to us as Saint Lucians and you've seen a manifestation of that dream and that vision, Mr. Speaker. But, Mr. Speaker, we need to step back a bit and reflect on some comments made by the opposition, Mr. Speaker, and especially the leader of the opposition because I really wish he would be here now to listen to the presentations made by the various members and for him to make his contribution and it was quite remarkable, Mr. Speaker, and disturbing at the same time, Mr. Speaker, that even when his attempt to play the cat and mouse game did not succeed and the Prime Minister might went on before his and the Speaker call on the Prime Minister, the Prime Minister had a graciousness to stand up and say, I'm going to yield and let you speak. But he did not even take up the offer, which tells me there was no sincerity in speaking to the issue that it was going to be a performance that's going to be drama and show and not substance, Mr. Speaker. And even when he was told, I am going to yield and the Speaker cautioned and sanctioned that he will not accept such behavior, you know, as a speaker. But the Prime Minister yielded to give him a chance to speak and the Prime Minister said clearly, I am letting you speak because I know I have a chance to answer you. So no matter what you say, I will be able to answer you. Why did he not speak? And I wanted him to present his own contribution on this motion, Mr. Speaker. And I'll tell you why. Because he said of by saying to us, none of us have ever been self-employed and we don't understand business and we don't know business in this in this chamber that, you know, we have no plan. We have no understanding. We don't know what we are about. And I sat there listening to him. This was the same member who came into this chamber and said that he's going to be a CEO Prime Minister. He's going to run the country like a business because he had the most business experience in the chamber. But watch what happened with the CEO Prime Minister. The company went bankrupt. The share value dropped significantly. And Mr. Speaker, watch where we found ourselves. And other members have already given, you know, an oversight of where he has taken this country. But this is the CEO Prime Minister. It is amazing how he thinks. He wants to convince us that he understands business. He knows the right model to do things. He's critical of the CIP and some of the changes we are making. But yet he was Prime Minister for the disastrous range issue. But how could you have been so wrong cause such a scandal of the range matter and still believe that your approach, your model is the right one and that you have the knowledge and you have the understanding. He still wants to convince us that DSH is right and the proper and is the model we should follow. He stands up there even today and wants to argue about all the glorious things about DSH. Where are the signs of any success at DSH? Where are they? Where are they? How do you want to convince us that you are such a success and that you know it all and we know nothing? Where are the signs? Where is it? And Mr Speaker, we can go on and on and each member can point out to you evidence of the failure of the last government. He wants to stand and to pontificate and arrogant upon himself the right to judge us and to say we know not what we're doing and that he knows what has to be done. You see, one of the things we said when I became Minister of Tourism is that we're not going to come every month and boast about numbers. That was a practice of the past. You'd recall every sitting of parliament in particular representative who sat across there would stand up and boast about numbers and numbers and arrivals and we said not that numbers are not important. Numbers are important because we want to bring visitors to the country.  But what's more important for us is how we structure this tourism industry that it can reflect the best of our people, the best of who we are and for us to ensure that solutions benefit from the tourism industry more than ever and we are very clear. We want more solutions to participate in the tourism industry and more solutions to own the tourism industry. And there's a simple logic for this. And I keep saying it every time I get an opportunity to speak. We want foreign investment. We want the present players to earn more than what they are earning. But we want the industry to get bigger so that more solutions can participate in it and earn as well. That is fundamental. Think about it. The mountains, the rivers, the trails, the beaches. That's a common heritage of St. Lucia. No hotel owns that. The people own it. All the warmth of our people that is so attractive and the member from Gifford North put it so well. We're not a people of violence. We are people of love. We know how to seduce people. We know how to show romance and love and be welcoming. That's who we are, Mr. Speaker, stop smiling. But that's exactly who we are. And therefore, these are the natural resources we have and who should enjoy the majority or the greater part of those natural resources but the people of the country.  But we must make sure that our people can boast that this tourism industry is delivering benefits to them. They can enjoy civilized standards of living and how they can see the children go to universities from their hard work. They can see opportunities for the children within the tourism industry. So, Mr. Speaker, next Tuesday, we'll come back to this house to present the Tourism Development Bill. And then, Mr. Speaker, we'll have a lot more to see about how we are restructuring this industry. But an essential component of this is what we are debating today, the Community Tourism Bill, Community Tourism Projects. This borrowing is about enhancing the capacity of solutions to benefit from the tourism industry. This is what it is about. And Mr. Speaker, the member from EcoSouth is not here. And the Prime Minister and my colleagues, we've always said, you know, that we want to stay focused on the task that the solution citizenry has given us, and that is to transform this country and to do away with the mess of the past. But if you want to speak about Community Tourism, you must start off, Mr. Speaker, as far back as 1997 with heritage tourism. And, Mr. Speaker, you must thank all those who came before us and contributed to shaping the landscape that exists now. You must say a special thank you to persons, the former Prime Minister, the former, the present Prime Minister, Mr. Felix Finis there, Nigel Michel, who passed so many individuals who contributed, the present PS in the ministry, so many individuals who contributed more than to introducing in St. Lucia the concept of heritage tourism, the concept of people's tourism, Mr. Speaker. It is not a new concept. It's not new. What we're seeing is an evolution of that. We are taking it to a different dimension, Mr. Speaker. But it is not entirely new. We won't pretend, Mr. Speaker, that we are the originators of all ideas and we know all things. We're not. We're not, Mr. Speaker. But let's go back, Mr. Speaker, a few years ago where the last government decided that they wanted to take further action, Mr. Speaker. Dr. Kenya Anthony, when he was Prime Minister and this morning he referred to the OR TCP, which was a regional tourism improvement project funded by the World Bank, together with a number of OECS countries. And part of that provided for increasing the product stock of community tourism. Part of it. And I'll come to some of it in a bit. But a decision was taken to advance the discussion on community tourism and, of course, to strengthen the institutional capacity. The last government decided to use five million dollars, EC, from the Republic of China and Taiwan, to fund community tourism projects. But rather than to do it the proper way. Same individual who says we have no plan. We don't know how to do things. We don't know how to execute. And the other ones that can execute, you know, they're still boasting about that. Decided to spend the money on ancillary, sulfuric, and grusily. But did not put in place the institution. Did not put in place the legislative framework. And did not put in place the policy framework to guide that development. But they spent the five million dollars. But we're not going to go back into all the details of it.  But five million was spent and they took a decision to also get a loan from the Caricom Development Fund for nine million dollars for on lending for persons who want to invest in community tourism. And, of course, a grant, Mr. Speaker, to help set up the institutions. Of course, one can always ask the question, why you want to spend money on projects when you have no institution, no staff, no oversight, no laws, no policy framework, nothing, but you spend in five million dollars already, Mr. Speaker. That was a decision taken then. We did it slightly differently. We ensured that we put in place the legislative framework. We ensured that we put in place the institution. We employed the staff.  So what you are seeing, Mr. Speaker, is the first stage of that take off, Mr. Speaker, to get it right, to make sure that all the elements are in place and we are now going to be building the product stock that is needed, Mr. Speaker. So when you look at the borrowing, which is the second tranche of borrowing from the Caricom Development Fund, always bear in mind that we already took a loan of nine million dollars to provide loans to persons who want to invest in community tourism. But we decided very early, Mr. Speaker, that we are going to change the name from village tourism to community tourism. And I've dealt with this in this house before. When you speak of village tourism in Saint Lucia, in the context of Saint Lucia, what are you talking about? Somebody in Barbono wants to start a project and they will speak of a village tourism project in Barbono or in Lafag. And our view was that's not village, that's community. We're really talking about a commonality of identity, of purpose, and of, you know, of experience. The notion of village does not resonate with that. Village in the context of Saint Lucia, the historical context, and like the member from before North put it, everything really has, things get meaning because of the context in which they are located. And that's a powerful way of describing it. Maybe it's sociolinguistics we have to go into that phenomenon has no meaning if you don't understand the context in which they exist. So when you speak of village tourism in Peru, people cannot associate to that. But when you say community tourism, the people of Peru as a community can rally themselves around that. We were told that it was going to be franchises and that communities and projects would have franchises. When you speak of franchise tourism, you think of Kentucky and that's what a franchise is. We said it would be better to see a partnership. That's our cultural context. You form a partnership with the community. You're not selling a franchise to them. That's not what it is about. So we made changes in name for sure, for sure, like the member from Microsoft said. But it is more than just name. It has substance behind it because it creates an understanding of purpose. It creates an expectation of what it is we're going to deliver. So, Mr. Speaker, we did make some changes for sure. I'll admit that but I believe it's for the better mentor of the program, Mr. Speaker. So we also made a third fundamental change. In the previous configuration, there was going to be loans made to applicants and we thought we wanted to reflect on this.  Some of them cannot qualify for the kind of loans we're talking about. So we had to decide to have a very low interest rate to be able to make it attractive but also to give grants to individuals. So if you, in the case of the member from Castro Central, wants to start their project, that is $90,000. You can take a $60,000 loan and he can get a $40,000 grant because he may not be able to sustain a loan of, okay, well, all right, yeah, of $90,000, whatnot. So, Mr. Speaker, we then and the Prime Minister led on this to get monies from Central Government, from the National Economic Fund, to actually provide resources to the community tourism agency so applicants can get both grants and loans as well to be able to make it attractive for them because we want ordinary solutions who do not normally qualify for commercial loans but who has an exciting idea, an exciting experience to be able to be part of the tourism industry. We did not believe that community tourism because of its very nature, its very concept, should be restricted to only those who can qualify for commercial loans. So we introduced the grant and loan component, Mr. Speaker. So now we have all the elements in place but we had some challenges and some setbacks and again, Mr. Speaker, in our, you know, progress as we move forward, we learn and we adjusted. When we issued a call for ideas and for projects, we got so many exciting ideas and persons went to the agency with ideas that they wanted and submitted it and then when they asked them, do you own the land, you want to create the experience, they did not own the land. Do you have drawings? They did not have drawings. Did you have this year approval? They did not have this year approval. So so many solutions came forward with exciting ideas but at different stages of development. So again, now we had to recalibrate and for us to decide we had to start from scratch with most of the applications and then for us to develop the idea. And I must say, not everyone is as, how do you call it, as expeditious as the member from Castro Central because when he came up with an idea for Serenity Park, within a couple of months he had drawings, costings, submission to Disney and he's ready to go. But not everybody has the same capacity or the same speed that he has. So we've had, you know, slight delays in certain communities because the institution itself now has to provide greater support to individuals who have ideas and, you know, some really fantastic, you know, proposals on the table. So in the next few weeks we'll start launching some of the programs that we have approved. We have funded and have started and you will see, Mr. Speaker, just over a year after or just about a year after we started the institution, we can start formally and nonsense projects that solutions have come up with for community experiences. But that just starts because this borrowing that we discussed in is about the next rock of projects that will be implemented and we have another round coming and we'll have more coming, Mr. Speaker, because this is so important. This is about ensuring that when visitors come to St. Lucia every single dollar, more of that dollar must be spent in St. Lucia and stay in St. Lucia. We cannot allow the tourist dollar to leave St. Lucia. We have to make some of it stay in St. Lucia and be enjoyed by St. Lucia's. So the member from Castries East would have pointed out that in this borrowing we have four projects that have already been identified and approved by the Caricom Development Fund. The first one is the Denry Fish Fiesta and the member from Denry South spoke of the Denry Fish Fiesta and he spoke of the history of it and it's important to the community and therefore we know what happened under the last dispensation, the last government, the last parliamentary rep and that this experience was allowed to wallow and to disappear. But it is important for persons on the East Coast for the community of Denry and for so many solutions we enjoyed, you know, the Fish Fiesta and therefore provisions is made to bring it back and to restore it to its former glory. The Seymour's experience, if you just reflect on the success that the chocolate experience has had in St. Lucia, whether at Capo St. Lucie, whether at Hotel Chocolat or other places in St. Lucia, where we've now become so well known and those of you who have seen the CBS clipping of the boasting of St. Lucia and for its chocolate and for the celebration of Valentine's Day, you would understand how far reaching the reputation of St. Lucia for quality chocolates is and we believe and from what we know about Solution Seymour's, we have an equally attractive product that we can create a special experience for. And a member for Miku North boasts that the best Seymour's comes out of the Pralé B. I cannot comment on where the best Seymour's, I don't know whether it is from Savant's B, whether it is from Fodor or where it is from or, you know, other parts of St. Lucia. But we want to create, with the parliamentary rep, a special experience in the Pralé area, a Seymour's experience where one can witness from the sea what's done, you know, to grow the Seymour's all the way to the manufacture of the various byproducts of the Seymour's. And I know his team is working very hard to develop the concept that will that will come with this. And of course what makes it even more exciting in the Pralé area is we in advanced discussions and a developer has already submitted plans for the revival of the L'Oparé de Project Mr. Speaker. Once that project Mr. Speaker is revived and the Seymour's experience can be established, that course Mr. Speaker will once again become a hive of activity Mr. Speaker. Mention was made of the Mon Lébaille and a member from Cassius North reminded us of his boyhood this at the Mon Lébaille and he spoke of selling trinkets and other art pieces of art to visitors when they came in. He didn't tell us of the late nights watching the stars, you know, at the Mon Lébaille. Although the member from Cassius Central said he passed in many a times, you know, at the Mon Lébaille, but for those of you whom we have known him he was very adventurous as a young man so he knows the area very well Mr. Speaker. But the Mon Lébaille Mr. Speaker is a very, is very well known, is one of the first rest stops out of the city and just before you get to the city it's probably the most famous Lébaille in St. Lucia and we all know the last Lébaille was not structurally sung, we had to demolish it and a new one will be built and I can tell you Mr. Speaker a lot of effort has gone into designing the new Mon Lébaille and hopefully in the next month or so once the money's become available we will start to work on the Mon Lébaille to have it ready for the next cruel season in October because we have the vendors in the temporary area but we need to make arrangements for them to make sure that they can get back to their normal, you know, cost of business and the fourth project under this motion Mr. Speaker is the Matters Shrine and this is our first journey into religious tourism it's our first journey into that aspect and using that aspect of our heritage and our culture to show the best of St. Lucia and if you only reflect there are few churches in St. Lucia where Sir Derek Wall Dunston Saint-Tome actually painted you know the Madonna's and the reflections of ourselves in our spirituality the Jack Mell Moshe you know some of those churches even the cathedral these are representations of our spirituality and the church stands at the center of it Mr. Speaker we all knew we all remember what happened a few years ago outside the cathedral and the loss of life Mr. Speaker and we all regret what happened but it's an opportunity for us to be able Mr. Speaker to to build a shrine for the departed person to serve the Catholic church Mr. Speaker and who lost their lives because of their faith Mr. Speaker that you know we have an opportunity to build a remembrance of them but at the same time Mr. Speaker to say to visitors you can come and learn about an aspect of our history and you know what it has meant for the church and the impact it has had on the church so we've been working with the church the church submitted the idea to us and told us they had an interest in this project we wholeheartedly embraced it and supported it we believe it will add a very valuable you know component Mr. Speaker to our tourism product and our community tourism product that visitors can actually visit the shrine when it is completed I've seen the preliminary drawings and it is very excited very exciting Mr. Speaker what they are proposing so this resolution will provide the resources for those four main projects Mr. Speaker but already we are looking to the next strong Mr. Speaker of the projects that you know we have to consider and all in an attempt to build Mr. Speaker greater value in our Saint Lucianness Mr. Speaker to expose more of Saint Lucian Mr. Speaker and a member from the North spoke about the German festival something that he had worked on for many years had gone dormant and was revived last October Mr. Speaker and he and I have sat down and we have done some visioning of where we want the drumming festival to go and we're thinking of a drumming festival that will become the premier drumming festival in this part of of the Antilles Mr. Speaker the entire Mr. Speaker where we can attract drummers from Africa from South America from all over to come to Saint George come to Bellevue come to Pérot spend the weekend they spend a few days Mr. Speaker where they can do workshops and drumming and teach that aspect of our heritage and of course to have a full-scale German festival Mr. Speaker and just imagine that happening in Viewfort North the growth of Airbnbs as persons who come down we'll want to look for accommodation Mr. Speaker and of course we all know Viewfort North is probably our most exciting cultural community Mr. Speaker with Bellevue and Cordrayle and all the other you know cultural you know cultural heritage Mr. Speaker order and therefore they the member from Viewfort North submitted a request to actually build amplifiers to amplifiers in the constituency that he can certainly add to to the cultural experiences that we offer as part of community tourism they needed because even last year for us to have the drumming festival we had to bring in infrastructure and infrastructure we had to bring in sometimes can be very sterile metal stages and you know it doesn't look like what we want they have an opportunity to design amplifiers that reflect the cultural heritage you know the member from Surazel was being tease about whether about building the bridge what not the one thing you can say at least on the bridge is they sought to have some reflection of the cultural you know heritage of the region in which a bridge was built and I think that's how we have to move as a country for us to have more reflections of ourselves in our surroundings and the member from Casual Central knows I always tell him about the murals that he's painted all over some parts of his constituency to continue to do so continue to to to paint ourselves let's look at ourselves on our walls on our bridges in our buildings I know the member from Viewfort South always used to have you know a big issue with this that too many ugly buildings have been built in the country and you have no character and you have no personality and he felt we should have buildings that that speak of who we are because architecture is part of the definition of self and who we are as a people so Mr. Speaker the Viewfort North has put forward proposals and we look in and I mean discussions with the member from Casual East about funding for for for for that project in Marsha the member from Casual East says we often forget him but there's an exciting proposal for an artisan village in the Marsha market to to redevelop and redesign the Marsha market and have an artisan village that will show the best of craft in St. Lucia in terms of letter work Mr. Speaker and you know I don't know how many of you all remember many many years ago maybe the member from Viewfort South might remember it and maybe Cassius North many many years ago in 1979 when the Labour Party won and this craft market was built was built in the Cassius city near the old marketing board in that area there a craft market was actually built there where you actually I remember as a young boy walking past that and you could actually see the craftsmen making sandals making belts you bought sandals there you remember that oh okay yeah no and you could actually go in there talk about 1979 under the Labour Party then where you could walk in and see the craftsmen making belts making bags making sandals and ride their drums riding the the lettercraft market where you might just come to think of it the member of Viewfort South probably was involved in that because I think he was a consultant advisor in the Ministry of Education and Culture at that time no so he probably would recall some of that but again that's what we want in Marsha to make it a centre for lettercraft and for artisan displays and of course I think the member from Caste East is looking for a place to house a silk hand side so we still think we're going to take that into consideration and that is another project that has been proposed you know what a hotel an Airbnb Mr Speaker yeah you know Mr Speaker if you think about it almost 300 000 persons leave Viewfort and drive up North to various hotels and Airbnb's and along that route sometimes they want a place to stop you know a place to take a drink you know to he said Falco and we need to start thinking of what are the stops along the route as you traverse around St. Lucia you know you have the lay-bys in January we need to upgrade it make sure it meets certain standards the more lay-bys but we had to think of ancillary we had to think of canneries and in Soufre overlooking the heritage the pitours the heritage site there's no look out there really there's no vending there are no toilets there is no place for somebody to buy something to eat so you drive by and you see persons parking their cars and taking photos even of the or you call it a plaque that is there but if somebody wants to use a restroom there are no no restrooms nearby there's no way you could buy a souvenir there's no way you could just decide let me just have a meal let me have some bits and other squash there's none of that and we are proposing around the island to identify strategic spots where we can build those same way you spoke about the bus stops and having the bus stops now becoming sites of commercial activity so we need to start thinking as you drive around the island what are the strategic spots so the moan and slurry there's talk of the Lacroix flats you know because there's a beautiful view of the valley the rosa valley from that area the Angiagap for example people stop to buy their corn I think somebody owns the land that area there Mr. Speaker and you know we can develop that that area if a proper stop Mr. Speaker so you can literally drive around St. Lucia right now the best bread you can get and visitors and have actually met visitors overseas who've boosted about the bread at Tomaso that they must have at Tomaso to eat hot local bread but we should have more of that around the island so as people move around they get cassava in canneries they get hot bread in Tomaso they might get something else you know in another community so creating more experiences and more opportunities Mr. Speaker the member from Catherine's office spoke about the hike in trail Mr. Speaker how can we develop that to add even greater to our adventure offerings Mr. Speaker you know they quite a few other ideas Mr. Speaker in Souffre another part of the island where we are receiving proposals and ideas of take the Monsito in Barbono I believe there's a meeting recently in Barbono and the ministry team went there and they was boasting to me one of the best views you can ever get Mr. Speaker is from that from that area and that we should do a lookout point there and some people ask why lookout points or why you want to do lookout points just think of the shared photo the memories of somebody taking a photo in one of the most futuristic parts of this Oof Mr. Speaker that they will carry with them wherever they go and that photo that memories of St. Lucia so those areas and those photos and those opportunities we create are valuable Mr. Speaker so as we look forward Mr. Speaker in Trosell Mr. Speaker we actually no no I come into that one it's something we've been working on in Trosell we actually working on a a craft tour Mr. Speaker where we'll have a specific designated tour where we visit selected craftspersons who are making cold pots making baskets you know the basket weaving what not and actually have it as an official tour Mr. Speaker and and think of what that would create for those craft you know people Mr. Speaker and we we've already discussed it and it's something we're going to work on visiting various waterfalls around St. Lucia just imagine somebody getting a special prize an extra theater hotel or whatever if you visit how many waterfalls in St. Lucia so many beautiful and enchanting waterfalls we have in St. Lucia Mr. Speaker that St. Lucia don't even know about I'm sure the member from Trosell can tell you quite a few because one of his hobbies is chasing waterfalls in St. Lucia and Rivers Mr. Speaker and and all those you know experiences are community experiences they tell of who we are as a people and for this Mr. Speaker this borough is another step as we develop St. Lucia we develop the product landscape Mr. Speaker we offer greater opportunities for St. Lucia to own part of the tourism industry and to show off the best of St. Lucia you know the member from Castle South spoke about and he's right we shouldn't do it just because of the visitors we shouldn't do it just because of them we have to do it because it's necessary but at the same time if you know your visitors come to your home you make an extra effort to clean it up and to sort out your house and to make it look more presentable that's our nature too think about the beaches and that's why the point he made really struck with me because it is true but we cannot continue to have our people going to use the beaches and there are no facilities there no toilets there no lifeguards we cannot continue to do it so we're not doing it just for the tourists but we're doing it for our people also Mr. Speaker so I am pleased to say Mr. Speaker that Simple Spark in Grozile is progressing very nicely Mr. Speaker and hopefully in the next few months we'll be able to open Simple Spark in Grozile Mr. Speaker we are going to work on a facility at Rajri Beach Mr. Speaker it's probably the busiest beach in St. Lucia again you have no toilet facilities there it's overcrowded during the cruise season and you know it is a problem Mr. Speaker I know in the clear view for VG well VG we already have some toilets there we have to develop it in view for Mr. Speaker we have to do a lot of work Mr. Speaker and we'll have to engage with the parliamentary representative for his vision of what he wants Dongdae and how he wants it to develop but we've already started speaking to a couple of stakeholders on the views as to what we can do we will be Mr. Speaker and I want you to take note of it the Caribbean Jewels project Mr. Speaker this is at Mon Pimad we're actually going to build with the developer the developer is actually going to build for us a beach park for St. Lucia that use that beach because those of you who know that beach is a little secluded there are no facilities in there and we want to create a space for St. Lucia to be able to continue to enjoy the beach there but also to create economic activity for them so you will see facilities going up in Rijri Mr. Speaker in the Mon Pimad area you will see facilities going up in Asfair along Millennium Highway the Bacai beach park will be totally renovated and upgraded Mr. Speaker like I said don't view fault we need to do some work in the sandy beach area and to do some you know development in that area so there's a lot that's going to happen under community tourism and in the restructuring of the tourism industry the member from view fault North said he's excited about the future well we all uber excited about the future and the prospects that it hold for our people and I want to thank the member from castles is the prime minister for continuing that journey that started many years ago and many other ministers of tourism have contributed to ensuring that we please St. Lucia's at the center of the tourism industry to be the greatest beneficiaries of the tourism industry and this is our historic task now to take that journey a lot further than it has ever been before my colleagues Mr. Mr. Speaker who continue to share the vision and support it and promoted Mr. Speaker that we will restructure redesign reorient the tourism industry and put our people first in ensuring that they can benefit from it and our visitors who come here will have the most memorable experiences ones that they will tell for generations to come and that will be the foundation of success for our tourism industry thank you very much


ing some work on this issue. This is not something like we're going from nothing to something. Provide on regular ongoing professional development and technology. This is actually a goal that comes from the teachers. It comes from my advisory committee. They very much want that. We have done this, and they want it to continue. So that is the goal in professional development. Could I just look on the last one there? Is that at all grade levels? Yes. Okay. It says in their classrooms. I just wanted all the teachers. Thank you. Okay. We can clarify that too and wording if you want. So the next goal, goal three. Wait, actually, let's... Are we done with goal three? We're going to... Let's discuss goal two. Yes, he starts. So I think that four dash two needs to move up into this one. It's about the diversity of staff, which is explicitly stated in the overarching goal. Yep. Four two needs to move up and become two four. It should be two four, not four two. Yeah, that's nice. Just flip them. Any more comments? Four, the overarching is about the operations, not the... Diversity. Not diversity. I lost it in my iPad. Four two is to develop a diversity. Anything else about goal two? I put my goals. That was my own. So the cultural competency goal is... So I'm just trying to understand that the group's not here anymore. Are they asking for a separate goal or is it kind of already represented by two? They were asking for a separate... A overarching goal. It feels like they're asking for specificity here. It would fit here. So it fits into two, but it's more specific. Yeah. Okay, so we... They wanted it as ongoing, not just a one time. Yeah. So they wanted it as a... one of the four overarching goals, but maybe they misunderstood. Yeah, right, right. But I think that the specificity would build a comparison. Yeah, okay. Anything else on goal two? Okay. Goal three. Goal three is about the resources, infrastructure, and educational environment narrowing to public schools. We have a lot going on next year. We have the Stratton project. Hopefully we will have the Thompson project moving forward. We hopefully will have the Gibbs project, which probably should put in there, which we didn't because we didn't have the votes at that point. And we have a multi-year technology plan. So I want to put it in there just to acknowledge the fact that we are moving forward on that. And then, which will be very time-consuming, as none of these are, is completing the modules for the MSBA process for the high school. So that's... Building emphasis. I thought she said she was finished. Are you finished? Just for clarification, facilities starting next year is not our province anymore? It will still be in our budget, but the budget itself is going to be managed by Ruthie Bennett. It will still reside in our budget. I thought that was just for a two-year period. She's consolidating the town facilities budget in FY17 and then 18, the school piece of it is migrating over to her. But for this upcoming year, she's going to be... We've defined facilities very clearly. It's a subsection of our budget. She's going to manage that portion of the budget, and I'm just going to keep an eye on her and make sure she doesn't spill over her boundaries. Will we still be made... If there's a need, facilities, water damage and stuff like that... If it's drastic stuff, we would handle it the way we would now. We would go to town for self-insurance money or anything like that. If we have another elevator type incident, that's going to have to stay within the parameters of her budget. She's going to have to cut something else within facilities. The reason I made that assumption is there was a debate the other night on the salary and that the now salary said... He didn't understand. That was crazy. I think that under this goal, actually, one of the things I'd really like to see is I think that we need to create two five- to ten-year plans. One, I want to see a maintenance plan for the schools that is through this new department and Dr. Bodie. I know that they know what they're going to do, but I want to see it on paper. I want to see what the maintenance plan is and I think that that needs to be a goal. I also think we need a five-year plan or a ten-year plan that, literally, school by school talks to what we are going to do about enrollment in every school because, again, I know that we have all this information, but it's not out there anywhere where anybody can follow it and understand it. We're changing this school and doing this school and doing that and doing that, but it's not written down anywhere. There is no plan. There's nowhere that says, ah, in the year 2018, we will be in this position of handling the Odyssey and we're handling the enrollment problem in 2018 at Dallen by doing this or, you know, like, I want to see how we're responding school by school to these enrollment numbers and I know that we have that information. I'm not saying that it's not being done, but I don't feel like we have it written down anywhere and organized in a way that other people can follow it and the school enrollment task force, the, you know, permanent town building, the town manager would all really could really use something like this. It's just our thinking put down on paper. Just as a clarification, I mean, we could do that in several different ways. One would be to ask for a report or something, but you'd like to put this in the goal section. I would like it to be a goal, so that we create the scent planning documents. I mean, actually, I plan to attend the subcommittee, that should be sent to the subcommittee. I think. Yes, Mr. Schlickman. I think that Ms. Starks has a very valid argument because we had a town meeting member get up last night and say, how come we don't maintain our facilities? And we do. And I think that, to have the documentation there and said we do maintain our facilities and this is what we do. And this is our long range plan in terms of helping us to build confidence in the community on our ability to take care of the facilities that we have. Well, actually, then I have a clarification question. Now that we're no longer in charge of the facilities, is it's really our purview? Well, I mean, I think when it, when we're talking about enrollment and school utilization, that's absolutely our purview. But in terms of maintenance. Well, you know, in terms, I mean, you're absolutely right that everything exists in a scattered way. And I think, you know, in terms of writing an overarching report that merely pulls the existing information together, that that's probably something that would be under my purview. And I'd certainly work with the facilities director now. That's not going to get into the granularity of, you know, this, this boiler is going to have its filters changed. Right. No, we're talking big picture. So you still see this as something that, that is part of the school administration. Oh yeah. I mean, we're going to move this, and it also intersects with the capital budget committee and the five-year planning of capital budget. So this is, you know, we would need to define a common understanding with the new facilities director, who I'm sure wants to do the best for us as well. But to have this clearly communicated back and forth so we know what's happening and that in the town, people in the town can look and see this. I mean, the question was, the facilities director made a very valid point about having incorporated the software as schedule or a ticket would go in for maintenance on an item when it is due, so that it would automatically be done. So now we've got this package from the software is doing it. All we need is a master report saying, okay, this is our maintenance schedule and what was programmed into this new device. Well, that sounds something different than what Starks was asking for. Well, it's along the same lines. Well, I think there's two requests, really. But actually, I just, I have a question for the committee, which is do we want to send this as is to the CIA? Or do we want to ask the administration to do more work before it gets there? Any thoughts in there? Yeah, Mr. They don't, the CIA has not got a date yet. So if Dr. Bode wanted to make adjustments to this, I see no problem with that. But I wouldn't want the CIA to be just constantly waiting for updates and updates like that. I assume, Dr. Bode, I won't assume you're coming. Well, I think this is the first conversation about it. Dr. Bode takes the conversation back. She edits it. We asked for some measures. She kind of prepares a document, some measures, and that's what the committee talks about. Anything else on Goal 3? Okay. Goal 4. No. Okay. Goal 4 is regarding operations, communication, and stakeholder engagement. Well, as you can see, the first goal is a continuation of one we had last year, which we made some progress on, which is the completion of a dashboard of district metrics. And the purpose of this is to provide the community with a quick overview of some of the key metrics about the school department. And community relations saw it and made some suggestions. We're sort of limited by the limits of the technology of our current website. But having said that, I think there's a lot we still could do and love to get that finished. We talked about already diversity APS staff. What we're looking to see is that we're going to increase the diversity from our current levels of staffing. And this was a goal last year. In fact, I think this has been a goal for a couple of years. And one that we revisit every year when we do hiring with our administrators. And then this one, Ms. Johnson wants to share with us some of the things we've been doing here because this is actually going to be quite impactful, too, in terms of the workings of the business office in implementing upgrades to our financial system. And we need to provide professional development to all the users so that we really can create some more efficiency in the operations. And I don't know if you'd like to speak a little bit more to that particular goal or something like that. But I think we're going to have things on go for. Yes, Mr. Cardin. This may not be the year to do it because this financial software going in as well. But, Dan, you talked about at the subcommittee meeting looking at future years. And I do think it would be helpful for communication with the rest of the town decision makers to have a multi-year budget roadmap. We're going to add a half of cluster here and a half of cluster there. So we sort of know where we're going with a lot of the staffing decisions based on enrollment numbers. And if we had those numbers in a three or four-year document, I think that would be helpful. We've always done it the other way. We've had a multi-year document based on the long-range plan and taking the money and basically showing what we have to work with on our current staffing levels. And we usually do that in the fall after our summer hiring settled down and we know what our teacher salary load looks like starting into the fall. If we were to do it the way you suggest, I think it's probable that you're going to have two very different numbers that you're looking at. And it might be somewhat inflammatory. So nice to see you. I think we have to do it though. I think it would be a document for us to look at. I don't know if they could see it, but I think it might be helpful in our projections going forward. Actually, I have something to add. I, you know, this is particularly a goal about communications, stakeholder engagement. And I think we have a bunch of projects going on and that we need to sort of develop a big picture overview of how to reach out to the community, how to reach out to teachers, how to solicit input these very expensive and important decisions that we need to really have a sense of for the Gibbs, for the Thompson, you know, what kind of committees are going to be involved? What's the timeline? What kind of public outreach are we just going to go on? I'd like to see a better sense of that in our goals. The high school, everything. We have a lot going on. We have a lot going on and the more people who are part of the conversation, not part of the decision, but part of the conversation, the better this is going to go for our community because it's a lot of money that this community is putting up. Okay. Yeah. In fact, I just had conversations along these lines with a representative to Vision 2020 and thinking about at what stage is along the way are we going to have ways that we hear the voice and community voices in some of these because it's important that they do have an opportunity to weigh in and we did that with Stratton and I expect that we will do that. In fact, I know we will do that with all the projects facing us. The high school one everyone is thinking about the high school and what it's going to look like and so there has to be opportunities for people to have input. Yeah. Yeah. And I would just say actually it's not just parents, it's teachers that this happens but it should be explicitly part of our goals that we're doing how we should teach. It's definitely going to be involved with teachers. Yes. Absolutely. Mr. Heiner. Just holding my head up. Any other comments, questions about? Nope. Okay. So are we looking, this is it. We've done everything else. We haven't done the superintendent's report. Superintendent's report. Yes. Okay. I have a question. Really? I just want to congratulate the teachers and students at Audison for an outstanding anti-performance. It was fantastic. But then on the same weekend we had the POPs which is also amazing. When you hear our high school students how they their level of performance and mastery of music is so impressive. So we are very fortunate that we have the teachers that we have that give their time to this because much of this is really is time that they give because they love doing what they're doing. So I want to thank them for that. And the last thing is that encourage people to take a look at the April newsletter because it's one of our longest ones and there is a lot going on in the school district. It's a great way for people to really get an overview of things that we don't talk about here at the table and there wouldn't be time to look at it as tonight goes. But it's a good way of seeing what's happening in all of our schools. And that is on the website right now. Mr. I had a question about drinking water with all the news, all the stuff going on about drinking water. I know that the state has released funds although it's a pit and sure it won't cover half of what needs to happen. But I wonder if we can get a report on the water quality in our schools or at least some information on how often we test are we going to try to go after some of that money? Yep, we are. We're definitely going after some of that money that we've had by the efforts by the health department. And yes, we have identified where we want to test the water. Some waters have been tested. In fact, interestingly I learned from the town manager that Leslie Ellis did a test at the Gibbs last year and the water was fine. Now, I don't know what fine means. I haven't seen the report but I am quite certain that there was probably a full survey and testing. So yes, we are doing that. And you're absolutely also correct that the money that the state's allocated is a drop in the bucket. And I can tell you that other towns have jumped on this right away. So we're scrambling to get our application in. Do we expect by the end of the year we'll have a better sense? I don't know. I don't know when they're going to give the awards up. I have another question. I saw in the notes that there was an announcement about a meeting with the state reps about the state budget on Monday. Does anybody know more about that or where it is and when it is? Clarissa made the announcement at town meeting last night. I thought I saw that. This Monday? I thought it was this Monday. The one coming up. No one has heard about it. I didn't know. Maybe that was. Motion to adjourn. Seconded. Seconded. All those in favor? Aye. That's an affirmative.


Hey guys, what is up? Welcome to my channel. So I'm so excited because for today's video I'm going to be doing a full face of trying out milk makeup Now the only thing I've ever used from milk makeup before was just an eyeliner and nothing else milk Almost seems a little bit gimmicky to me It's a brand that I always like kind of stare at their display and then don't purchase anything It also is just a very different brand and I feel like all the cool kids use it and I'm not cool enough to use it Yeah, so I saved up some money and I went to Sephora and I picked up everything I needed to create a full face definitely not going to do these types of videos very often because this was I spent like well over three hundred dollars So I better like everything so I'm gonna take you along and shopping with me So you can see me picking some things up from the store Yeah, so I'm gonna go with medium light I don't know how good that is, but we'll try then concealer We will do light medium last one translucent light powder Lip and cheek is sold out great bronzer in baked and I'm not trying the brow thing that looks too thick. I know I won't like it's not worth my money. I will try They don't have my color So I got everything I needed so now I'm just gonna walk around and look for fun stuff $200 Okay, so actually that was weeks ago So all this stuff has kind of been sitting in my room with just all the releases and stuff I just haven't gotten around to trying all this stuff out So you guys have no idea how pumped I am so the first thing that I picked up was the luminous Blair stick now I have tried a sample of the regular Blair stick and I wasn't that into it I don't know why I think I'm going to be into this So this is like $36 so I better love it because I didn't have the mini I tried to get the mini and as many things as I could so I don't even know how to use this Luminous Blair stick primer. I don't know. I'm just gonna Put it everywhere. Oh that is glowy Maybe probably shouldn't have Put it on my pores. Okay. Oh So she's Illuminous, okay, I don't think I'm going to like this. This may have to go back So this I feel like is a little bit dry on my skin and I have dry skin So it does add a luminous. Ooh, actually this does add a really pretty luminosity to my skin That's like very natural like I could wear this without any makeup. Um, I wouldn't put it over here I wouldn't do that cuz it said it was blurring. I really don't see anything Blurring at all but it actually does add a really pretty sheen I don't know that this is worth 36 dollars though. I'm going to play with it some more, but so far Okay, so the next thing that I got was foundation. So I got the Blur liquid the matte foundation blur liquid in Medium light. I felt like the colors were kind of weird. I was going back and forth on what color I was This is what I settled on with my eyelids look pink. I just filmed a ABH Riviera tutorial So I use the hot pink. So it's supposed to be full coverage for every skin type and matte I'm actually liking that luminous primer more than I thought I would so I don't know why I just applied so much at once I mean, this is like the complete wrong undertone on me actually is pretty full coverage though I really like the packaging of this. It's very mess free I'm just gonna play a touch more on the areas that I need some coverage So I definitely when I was trying to find my shade I thought that these had very weird undertones. I probably could have gone a shade lighter, but this is Super yellow on me. It'll be fine once the full face is there, but this is looking pretty full coverage to me I would say medium to full. It's matte I can see a little bit of luminosity peaking through from that primer which is growing on me already So the foundation is actually sitting on my skin very nicely. I really like it It looks very natural while having a lot of coverage. It doesn't look cakey at all So so far I'm liking that so they did have an eyebrow pencil in their line, but it was too thick for me I knew I wasn't going to like it and I didn't feel like wasting my money So I did pick up the kush fiber brow gel in the shade Dutch So this is like a fiber brow gel with some color to it So I usually don't like these types of products I do kind of like more of a defined brow, which isn't the vibe for milk. They're much more natural This is like really messy. I'm not doing a good job applying this I did luckily get my eyebrows done yesterday So my eyebrows don't really need too much playing with if I were to use this when my eyebrows were unruly I don't think this would look as good So I'm kind of trying to emulate that whole feather brow as you can see it like already made a disgusting mess So this is a product that definitely I will need to get used to I think potentially I could have gone Lighter in the shade, but I actually like this. This is really good for a natural brow It's a little more liquidy than I was expecting so I have a little bit much Product right here, but that was user error. So this definitely has a learning curve Now I need to clean up this mess. Oh my gosh. Do you guys kind of like it though? I feel like it was really quick. Okay, that looks a little better. This is what I mean Like this brand is too cool for me. I can't do the feather brow I really can't do this effortless. I spent no time on my makeup. I woke up like this look It wouldn't be that bad if I didn't like clump up product here So actually I quite like this brow gel I do think that it's gonna take me some practice to really master it I just pulled it out and just popped it right in the inner half of my eyebrow Which is where I want it to be the lightest so that was not smart of me And I don't think this is a product I can use when my brows are not freshly done right now today I actually really do like this. I feel like I'm really cool and have a cool kind of feather brow vibe Kind of I'm not that cool. Okay. I really like this though. So next I got the flex concealer Something tells me I got a shade. That's too dark on me. I got mine in the shade light medium I don't like how their names are right here. So Actually, that's the perfect shade. Love that.  I think it has medium coverage. It feels very lightweight under my eyes I look so yellow right now. I mean for concealer the real test for me is how it wears but so far I'm super into this concealer like I think it looks super good and it looks really smooth under my eyes Sometimes with concealers I can kind of see the bumps right here that are on my face. I really feel like they're blurred moving on I did get the baked bronzer. I don't know how I'm gonna open this So I'm actually really excited for this because I love cream bronzers I haven't been courageous enough to dip into that whole cream product thing that's going on right now Oh my gosh, there's like sticky stuff at the bottom of this and I can't get the freaking product out But yeah, I have not really dug into the whole cream product vibe, but I do Love a good cream bronzer. So I got baked. I even got the full size in this because it's pumped for it this side I'm going to Use a beauty blender to blend it out just to see how she blends Okay, she's blending quite nicely. I love this. This is such a good color It blends out really well. So definitely keeping this. I really really like that I am going to try and use a Stipple brush as well I really like it just applying it straight to my skin with the beauty blender or even just taking the beauty blender right on that So beauty blender for the win for this product and I just I love the tone of this I think it's really pretty it's warming up my skin But also giving it some shape and definition and it's blending out very good, too So I've heard a lot of people talk good things about this bronzer and I get it It's gorgeous and also while I'm at it since they don't really sell eye shadow I am just going to take some of that and just apply it into my crease for some definition I'm like so obsessed with this. Wow. So now we have a cheek color. This is the work lip and cheek Stick I should have opened these before filming because half of this footage is literally me I'm also excited for this. I really want to start getting into cream blushes more I do have a couple that I do like Super pumped for this So with a stippling brush, it's really soft.   I do have some lipsticks, but I do just kind of want to see this as a lip color Hmm, this is actually a really pretty lip color as well like a nice nudey pink I actually really like this because this really looks like my skin. That's flushing. I'm cool I'm into this. Okay, so the next thing I got was the highlighter in lit their little highlight stick now This was open in my bag. I don't know how that happened It wasn't open when I bought it, but when I just went in to grab it from my bag It was sitting open.  So this is super duper natural I don't know that I can necessarily Get super into this product and like never use powder highlight again, like that's not going to happen I don't like this that much, but this did work and it looks my skin looks really great right now I look super pretty and like natural and fresh milk makeup so far everything I've bought I'm keeping which is crazy. So next we have the blur and set powder I got mine in translucent light and again, I'm struggling to get this open. Hold on. Hold on I'm using scissors pray for me. So this powder actually seems to be quite popular a lot of people like it And I love a good translucent powder So I'm just gonna blend out my under eyes, but the concealer sitting really pretty without being set by the way Oh, this is the one with the really smart packaging where it's like that thing I think I'm already keeping this so just with this packaging I'm already obsessed with it because all you do is like you press onto this thing and It's like mess free almost and I'm just going to set underneath my eyes Probably just took away all the glow from that highlight. So I'll put more on love this packaging. Okay, so I don't know if you can see But some of my dryness right here is Showing it's not bad. It's not bad I'm actually just having like a really dry day today So I don't want to knock on that too much because that is kind of my fault But if you do have dry skin the powder did just kind of sink right in there my under eyes do look really really soft I don't know. I'm confused. I'm going to reapply a little bit more of a highlighter Powder made it lose some of that glow. It's acting really well over the powder as well So besides that little dry patch that's showing my skin looks really good And it feels really light and it looks very very natural. So I did get one of their eye pigments I love products like these so I wanted to get so many colors, but since I didn't know whether or not I liked them I only got one and this is the shade after party. It's like kind of a metallic pink I'm helping out all over the lid. Oh, I love it. And this is why we put that bronzer down So this is looking very very frosty. Um, don't know. That's really a luck I would normally go for but so over here. I have a thick layer on over here is the thinner layer Gonna build that up a little bit I don't know how different these are going to look on the lid from the other shades because This is blending out to be quite a frosty shade and not necessarily as pink as it looked in the tube I definitely like this though It's just like a really easy way to get something on your lid that looks nice And I'm just applying just a tiny bit more of that bronzer. I really like using this cream bronzer in the crease I think it looks really awesome So the next thing that I got and you guys are so lucky because I wasn't going to get this because I literally Do not have eyelashes mascara just doesn't work for me But I felt very incomplete not using a mascara so I got the Cush mascara I almost bought the full size and then thank goodness I saw this little anybody in the little checkout aisle and this is really heavy and the packaging is feels really Expensive for a mini one, so I'm not gonna curl my lashes just because I never do my eyelashes are straight and Nothing works on them except waterproof mascara, so I'm just gonna put these on my lashes really fast I've heard good things about this mascara too, so So this is with the first coat. It's quite lengthening. I wouldn't trust my mascara review I'm not qualified to review mascaras because my lashes just don't carry mascara well So I'm going to apply a second coat though, but it's just a mascara to me. I don't really notice anything This is a second coat. I mean it did lengthen and separate my lower lashes the mascara like I said I'm not really gonna speak on it didn't make me look like I have fake eyelashes, but nothing does so Yeah, so the last thing I ordered these two online because they didn't have these in store yet I picked up two of their new lipsticks. I actually was very curious about them and I'm so indecisive I couldn't pick one shade, so I got two so the first one that I have here is skills Really pretty nice magnetic packaging and this is skills. Oh really creamy Oh, and it has like a magnetic clasp. This is such a pretty peachy nude shade. Oh my gosh I love it really creamy. Okay. I love this color and it really glids on my lips super easy So again that one was skills and now we're going to apply wifey, which is a lot deeper This is my type of color too So I really do like both of these colors skills is such a gorgeous nude And this is one of those colors that I wear for just like every day when I want to liven up my face But not be too bright. So the lipsticks feel very creamy. They're very pigmented and super into these lipsticks This is the completed look. I really am enjoying how I look I think I look really fresh and really pretty and I'm just very satisfied. So I'm going to kind of quickly go over everything I'm not too sure about the luminous blur stick.  I like it It seems to be a very nice matte foundation. I think I will like this with a touch of oil in it And I mean, it's not my perfect shade. It's a little bit too golden for me But that's my own mistake But honestly when I was playing with their colors, they didn't really have one that would match me So I needed something a little bit more neutral and they just didn't have it in my shade kush fiber brow I really like this. I don't own a lot of products like this I think it is a bit too wet for my preference So I'm going to have to adjust based on that But other than that I actually really really like this and I can see myself Continuing to purchase this then we have the baked bronzer. This is awesome I think this might be my favorite thing in this whole video I really do enjoy this it blends beautifully in the color of it Perfection the work lip and cheek color. I do like this I don't see myself using at this product a ton But I am going to keep this because it is just like a little $14 mini sample And it just it looks very very natural and I do like the color of my lips as well So I don't dislike this. I don't think it's that special, but it's okay I do like it the little mini highlighter in lit again really really natural I don't think I'd ever replace my powder highlighters with this, but it is nice. I Don't know. I don't it's not really lit It just is what it is. Oh, I forgot to talk about the concealer I really really really like this concealer. I like the coverage on it I like the finish of it really really good from what I can tell so far anyways the powder I need to play with this some more. I'm not too sure so many people like it And I don't think I love it But I need to play around with it with more familiar products to me so I can really Judge it and how it works. I pigment I like I do think it is a bit overpriced for what it is because it definitely Sheared out it is pretty I wouldn't mind playing with a couple other colors Just to see if it's just this color That's really frosty or if all of them are and they blend out to be sheer, but I do think this is a bit overpriced I think it would have been in their best interest to cut them out of product in half And then cut the price in half as well because no one's ever gonna use this much product anyway So I think just cutting everything in half would have been perfect And then that would have been the exact right price point the mascara I have no eyelashes, so I really don't know and finally the lipsticks. I really really like these lipsticks I like the two colors that I got and they're really creamy. So these were my first impressions I'm going to play with these some more, but for now I am going to do a slight wear test So I don't think I'm gonna go the full eight hours because it is just hitting three o'clock It's two fifty five, but I will wear this for at least six hours just to see how everything wears But just so you guys know I think I feel really really pretty I feel very fresh very natural. I'm really excited about this. So catch in the check-in. Hello. Hello, okay So it is about nine o'clock. I'm just gonna tell you how to make a board This isn't really a wear test But I did just want to update you on how everything's looking if over time my opinions on things have changed and Honestly, my skin and my face looks so good It looks almost as good as when I applied it I'm definitely a little bit more shiny from my oils coming through but not anything bad It's just made me look more natural than anything. So for a matte foundation. I really like how this wears It's not settling into my smile lines that bad my eyebrows are In place the only thing I will say is I did notice a little bit of flaking with the mascara the eyeshadow eye pigment It has not crease which is awesome. It has lost a little bit of the reflectiveness But honestly, I kind of prefer a little worn down just looks a little less frosty of course the lipstick came off I've been eating but I really do enjoy the lipsticks. They're very smooth very creamy very easy to apply very lightweight on the lips I mean so overall I'm just digging the overall Vibe of this makeup the concealer did crease a little but nothing too bad like it It just looks natural everything looks really really good that being said I'm going to continue to wear this makeup kind of play around with it in my routine to see what I actually really do like and What I don't like so much and what I like to do with these products to maybe make them work better for me So keep an eye out for an updates video. I'm gonna start doing those It's on my list to do one very soon not for these products in particular But just products in the past that I've already talked about that being said milk definitely It's not my favorite brands by any means, but they have some good stuff But of course, you know, I'm all about liner lashes glitter eyeshadow milk It's just not that type of vibe But they do have some really good pieces in their collection that I'm looking forward to continue playing with So now I have a new brand that I cannot wait to purchase more releases from so I hope you guys enjoyed this video I hope you found it helpful. Let me know if you've tried milk makeup and what some of your favorite products from them are Let me know I seriously want to know I'm really into this brand now So remember to like this video comment down below and subscribe to my channel And I will see you guys in the next video. Bye guys. Have a great day


Hello and welcome. It's Global Political Economy, NewsDocs. I'm Lynne Fries. As the COVID-19 lockdown poses unprecedented problems for economic policy makers, some countries have more problems than others when it comes to implementing an effective and appropriate government response. The issue being dogmatic taboos and prejudices about debt management and monetary policy can stand in the way. This NewsDoc explores how that applies in Europe, more specifically the European Monetary Union, with its German doctrine that the central bank must under no circumstances finance state budget deficits. Here to talk to us about this is Heiner Flasbeck. A macroeconomist, Heiner Flasbeck is publisher and editor of Flasbeck Economics International. Prior to this, he was director of UNCTAD's Division on Globalization and Development Strategies. From 1998 to 1999, Heiner Flasbeck was state secretary in the German Federal Ministry of Finance. Welcome, Heiner. Thanks for joining us. Welcome for inviting me. Heiner, as the COVID-19 lockdown is a state imposed standstill on the economy, what's happening now with the shutdown of production is a kind of shock which is different from what we've seen in other crises in the world economy. Let's start there. Comment on how the governments are responding. What the government does is just to buffer the negative income effects of this lockdown. And that's a different thing, but nevertheless the government needs huge amounts of money because we're talking about something like a loss of 20% or in the end it will be 25% of our overall income of GDP for us domestic product, which is obviously a huge amount of money. And this has at least partly been compensating by government debt. And this government debt has to be financed through a very large part by the central bank because if this increase of government debt would lead to dramatically rising interest rates, that would really then be a big burden. The central banks have to do their job, which is to keep the interest rates low. And they do it in part at least by buying the papers that the government is issuing. So giving credit to the government in an indirect way, in the direct way in the United States, it's indirect in the United Kingdom, it's direct in Europe, it's indirect. But nevertheless it's always the financing that comes, majority of the financing comes from central banks. So call it money printing or money creation, however you call it. But definitely the central banks by keeping the interest rates low are so to say providing the governments with the money that is needed to cushion at least a little bit the effects of the Corona shock. In Europe there is a lot of controversy about the role of the central bank. Tell us about that. Well in Europe to be concrete in the European Monetary Union we have a very peculiar situation indeed because we have a central bank, but that central bank is not obviously, it's not obviously the central bank of each and every country. We have created by treaty, Maastricht Treaty, European Monetary Union which has dramatic flaws in the treaty already. So that the treaty says very clearly any kind of central bank financing for the government, for any government is forbidden. This leads to the curious situation that weaker countries in inverted commas, weaker countries, can have difficulties on the capital market to get the means that they need, the money that they need now to fight the crisis like Italy.  It would be very simple to solve the problem in the European Monetary Union if as I said the central bank would behave as the central bank of each and every country because then the central bank would do what she does in all countries of the world more or less. She would go to the capital market and keep the interest rates low. But keeping Italian interest rates as low as German interest rates is already seen by many in Europe as a violation of the treaty. It is urgently needed to change this arrangement and to give the ECB, the European Central Bank the freedom to do what is necessary to keep the interest rate rate of all members low and to fight the capital market. Now the ECB has found a pragmatic way to deal with it. They have a new program, a pandemic program and they said they are much more flexible in this program than ever before and the markets have clearly interpreted this in a way that they say, oh, be careful if you speculate against Italy. The ECB may be so flexible that she would counteract and she would avoid that the Italian interest rates go up so that the spread between Italy and Germany rises. So there is it somewhere in the gray zone of legality but what the ECB does is absolutely reasonable. The problem is that the politicians in particular in Germany do not want to discuss this openly. Now we add even the court, the German, the highest German court ruling that the ECB policy is inadequate to a certain extent which brings a new danger to the whole arrangement so that it is not quite clear how the ECB fends off this accusation, the signals that we have now from the judges that were behind this ruling. Well, they say, oh, we didn't mean it exactly like this and so they are really surprised by the harsh criticism all around the world.  This is the German way or the European way to deal with things. We do something behind the scenes so we have a lot of telephone calls and we try to settle without explaining and without attacking the real problem which is behind that. I think they will find a way and the court will not complain because, as I said, the court itself is shocked by the reaction to its ruling. In a commentary about this ruling on the European Central Bank by the German Constitutional Court, you wrote that economic logic is not the domain of jury prudence, the upshot being the way you see it, the judges got lost in what you called a complex economic jungle. As a macroeconomist, what do you think is one of the things least understood about macroeconomics? What many people do not understand, unfortunately, is the interconnection, the interrelationship between current account balances and the public budget and the the rest of the saving and debt balances that we have in the economy. The simple thing is that wherever there is a saver there must be a debtor. You cannot have one group of the economy saving without another group being indebted. The traditional arrangement in the whole world was in the 60s and 50s and 60s when we had wonderfully booming economies. The arrangement was private households would be savers, net savers and the companies would be the net debtors and the government would keep out and externally not much would happen. So now that has changed dramatically in the last 10-15 years, now we have companies, well, as a result of the neoliberal revolution, obviously, we have the wonderful world where we do not have this traditional arrangement anymore. Some people say we do not have market economy anymore because what happened, we now have the companies as net savers in most countries, United States and Europe, more or less everywhere, Japan in particular. But if the companies are net savers also, we have private households net savers, company net savers, then obviously for the world as a whole, there's only one party that can be a debtor. For the world as a whole, that's the government. There is nothing else. But smaller countries or middle countries like Germany can go for a solution, solution again in inverted commas, which means, oh, the foreign, the foreigners can be the debtors. So if you are able to achieve a current account surplus, you are in the wonderful situation that the foreigners are the debtors, and inside a country, all the sectors can be savers.  Because if you are a deficit country in Europe, in particular in the Monetary Union, like France and Italy, has formally a surplus, but is a deficit country because it has lost competitiveness because of Germany. But if you have lost competitiveness, you're not able to go for a current account surplus in a growing economy as Germany did because Germany prevents you from doing that. Then you end up with a situation if your companies are also net savers, that the government has to go for a deficit. The government has to allow deficit if the government does want to avoid permanent recession or permanent stancel or permanent downfall of the overall economy. So that's for logical reasons. Italy could not do what the Germans did. And so here comes now the political dimension of this. Now the Germans say, oh, we are strong. We have done the right thing. Italy, the Italians are weak. They have done the wrong thing.  Other economists that I've talked to about this myth or prejudice that surplus countries are good and deficit countries are bad, explain that at the world level, income equals demand. So at the national level, when a country like Germany runs a surplus, that means their level of demand is below their level of income. Do you agree with that? Absolutely. They're living below their means, as we say. Germany is living below its means. It spends less than it could and should. And that means other countries are lacking demand. So a country like France that has a deficit with Germany is lacking demand from its own savers. It's lacking demand from its own companies and is lacking demand from the foreign trade, in foreign trade. And that means it's overall lacking demand. So who could compensate for that? There's only one group left logically. And this is the government. So the government has to go and create demand, so to say, by living beyond its means.  But that is exactly what is needed. The government has to spend money that it doesn't have because all the others have money, but they do not spend. And this has to be compensated. Otherwise, any economy in the world would collapse in a very short time. So this is obviously what we have to learn. This is macroeconomic logic. It's called logic. It's bookkeeping, more or less. But it is unfortunately not understood by very many people. And it's not understood by the majority of our traditionally trained neoclassical economists. In an op-ed called Corona Politics and the European Challenge, you drew attention to the fact that Germany had a trade surplus with Italy, France and Spain of 63 billion euros in 2019 and that the volume of trade between these countries was 376 billion euros. Explain the point that you go on to make, that if these three economies collapse for a very long time, Germany will not be able to expect a recovery for a very long time, not to mention the political consequences. I should also note in parenthesis that after Germany, France, Italy and Spain are the second, third and fourth largest economies in the European Union. Yeah, that's absolutely right. Germany needs these countries. Germany needs Europe and more than any other country because Germany is dependent on exports more than any other big country in the world. The export share in the GDP is 50%. This is extraordinary. It's absurd for such a big country to have such a huge export share. A country like Switzerland can have that are others or Netherlands, but for Germany it's really absurd. But it depends. So its whole structure is biased towards exports and if this breaks now in one way or the other, then Germany will be hit by the crisis much more than other countries. And if Italy, France and Spain and others do not get out of this crisis in a reasonable way, then Germany will be hit more than the others. That's no doubt about it. Heiner, the European stability mechanism, the program designed about a decade ago is the EU bailout fund at the time of the European sovereign debt crisis, has been widely criticized as not getting at the real problem, but just kicking the can down the road, extend and pretend. But not only for that, also for its loan conditionalities. In other words, austerity, which were seen as damaging and brutal. That austerity was justified by blaming the recipient countries for profligacy, like at the time Greece was at the receiving end of the moral hazard argument that weak or bad governments should not be rewarded with cheap credits. In the current corona crisis, no one's blaming Italy or Spain for profligacy, but just the same, a proposal for euro or corona bonds by nine EU member states, including Italy and Spain, was rejected. Germany and the Netherlands rejected the proposal, as you've explained, because they were unwilling to accept shared debt without the power to impose further structural reforms on so-called weaker economy. Well, again, the Europeans have not really learned the lesson of the last 10 years. We should have understood this relationship that I explained between government balances and private balances, but many politicians at least do not have and economists as well, which is a big problem, because we need exactly this logic to get out of the trouble in which we are, because, as I said before, only if we're able to spend, only if the government is able to do its job at this moment of time, then there is a way out of the crisis. If we go back to austerity, or as many people start talking now, we got back to a period of 20 years of saving and of restricting, well, then Europe will be definitely dead in a couple of years, because then it's quite clear that the electorate will not go with these politicians anymore that are ruling us now, but they will go to the right, they will go to nationalist parties, and the nationalist parties will then destroy Europe. This is a possibility, and it's getting more probable day by day. This is a quote from your op-ed, Monsieur Macron, the Germans, and Europe. Perhaps never before has a French president said so clearly that the way some northern EU nations are currently conducting themselves can very quickly bring about the end of Europe. He warned strongly against populism, the nationalist forces that could gain the upper hand in southern Europe and in his own country, and also that Macron clearly understands the consequences by pointing to a historical error of his own country, which is still not understood and appreciated in Germany of all countries. He says, Macron, that it was a major mistake of the Allies after the First World War to insist on German reparations in the Treaty of Versailles. Yeah, indeed. I'm not a fan of President Macron, but at a certain point it was two or three weeks ago he gave an interview to Financial Times where he spoke out very clearly and with a lot of insight that I did not expect to see coming out of him. He said very clearly that Europe cannot continue like this, and then to my big surprise he really mentioned the problem that had arisen after the First World War where the Allies forced Germany to pay reparations, and one person in the world obviously knew that it would end up in disaster and that person was John Menett Keynes, and he called this problem the transfer problem. That is the problem that you cannot create current account surpluses which Germany would have needed at that time if your partners do not allow you to do that, if they insist, if they defend their current account surpluses. This is indeed a dramatic similarity to the today's situation because Italy would have to create a current account surplus, but Germany is insisting that it sits on its current account surplus and fighting anything Italy could do to create a current account surplus, so at the same time the Germans ask Italy to reduce its debt, which is impossible if Italy cannot create a current account surplus, and this is the paradox that was at that time created by the transfer problem how Keynes called it, and as I said Keynes was as much as I know the only person in the whole world who understood this macroeconomic logic, but it's exactly the logic I've been talking about before when I talked about the fiscal balances inside the economy and the surpluses and deficits, and the tragedy is that today in today's world nobody in Germany understands this logic anymore. This is the core of the matter in Europe, but coming back to Macron, let me say one thing that is important now, yesterday Macron and Merkel came with a new initiative to spend money in southern Europe and the countries that are the weaker countries again, but this is exactly the way they always try to solve problems in Europe, namely there is a problem now it's a huge tension between Germany and France after the Macron interview, after this ruling of the German court, now they come together they say oh we're creating a new program, we show that the axis between France and Germany is working, that it's functioning, pushing Europe ahead, they're not talking about the real problems of the monetary unit, they do not address these problems, they do not tackle these problems, but they taper it over by a new program, nobody knows what will be the outcome, whether it will be done or not, but this is the kind of window dressing that they do all the time in Europe and this is the big problem and this is the big mistake that the politicians are not open or not able, I don't know, not open and not able to really talk straight about these problems and try to solve these problems, as long as the euro group or the European finance ministers including the center bank do not agree on the simple rule that says this center bank is the center bank of each and every country, then the uncertainty remains and the countries cannot act as they should to fight these disastrous outcomes of the corona shock. Heiner Flasbeck, thank you. Thank you for having me. And from Geneva, Switzerland, thank you for joining us for this episode of Global Political Economy or GPE News Dogs.