“You don’t get to create a burden, remove it five years later and celebrate as though you’ve done the public a favour,” Shadow Minister of Transport Craig Cannonier said
Mr Cannonier said, “Transport Minister Owen Darrell has proudly announced that motorists will no longer need a doctor’s certificate for most driver’s licence renewals, describing it as a way to save Bermudians money, time and unnecessary inconvenience.
“What the Minister conveniently leaves out is that his own PLP Government introduced this requirement in 2021, under then-Minister of Transport Lawrence Scott.
“For five years, Bermudians had to arrange doctor’s appointments, pay for medical examinations and deal with the inconvenience of complying with a policy the Government now acknowledges was unnecessarily burdensome.
“Now Minister Darrell wants credit for removing it.
“You don’t get to create a burden, remove it five years later and celebrate as though you’ve done the public a favour.
“The Minister owes Bermudians some straightforward answers.
“How much money did motorists spend on these medical certificates over the past five years?
“What evidence justified the requirement in the first place?
“Did it produce any measurable improvement in road safety? And what other factors led the Government to reverse its own policy?
“Removing an unnecessary requirement is welcome. But taking credit for the saving while failing to account for the original cost is not what transparency looks like.
“Bermudians deserve more than congratulations from the Government for fixing a problem it created. They deserve an explanation of why it happened in the first place.”