[Opinion column written by OBA Senator Victoria Cunningham]
The Minister of Education is right when he states in a recent opinion piece that the conversation about an Education Authority should begin with our children. He is also right that school reform takes years and should not be reversed every time a Minister changes.
But Bermuda has seen exactly that happen. In early 2025, the Working Group developing education reform was stood down after a Cabinet reshuffle. It was revived only when the current Minister returned to the portfolio.
That is the problem an Education Authority should solve. The One Bermuda Alliance supports an Independent Education Authority, and we have argued for one. The question is not whether Bermuda needs one. It is whether this Bill creates one.
In July, the Minister set out how the legislation should be judged: whether appointments are genuinely merit-based, whether accountability is enshrined in law, and whether the framework will endure across administrations. Those are the right tests. The Bill as tabled does not yet pass them.
The Bill’s opening words create “an autonomous body.” The same sentence then places it “under the general direction of the Minister.” The Minister may issue written directions on any matter he considers to be in the public interest, and the Board must have regard to them. Nothing requires those directions to be published.
Parents should also know that this Bill does not hand the day-to-day running of our schools to anyone. On education, the Authority’s role is to “make recommendations to the Minister.”
The process for selecting the initial Board members has merit. Independent criteria are set, and the Minister must publish how each appointee meets them.
But the first Chairman and the first Chief Executive Officer are appointed directly by the Minister. That bypasses the open selection process the Bill itself creates for the CEO. The Minister also sets members’ terms and pay, fills vacancies, and can remove members on broad grounds without independent review. And the ex officio seat promised in July to the Commissioner of Education has gone to the Permanent Secretary instead.
On the hardest transition questions, such as abolishing Department posts and setting up new school governance, the Board “shall act in accordance with” the advice of a Transition Advisory Committee. That committee includes the Permanent Secretary and public officers appointed by the Minister. An independent board bound by the Ministry’s own officials is not independent where it matters most.
Quarterly reports on student outcomes, monthly progress reports and the annual operating plan all go to the Minister. None of them must be published or laid before Parliament.
The Bill also makes it a criminal offence, with fines of up to $25,000, for anyone at the Authority to disclose its affairs to anyone other than the Minister or the Authority itself. There is no protection for whistleblowers. Independence and accountability should go together, but this Bill points both at one office.
The Minister decides when the reform provisions come into force, so the 18-month clock starts only when he says so. When it ends, he may lay a Bill, or he may explain the delay, every six months, indefinitely. The budget needs annual approval from two Ministers, with no multi-year protection.
A future Minister could stall this reform without changing a word of the Act. That is exactly what happened to the Working Group in 2025.
The One Bermuda Alliance will seek to bring constructive amendments to:
- appoint the first Chair and CEO through the Bill’s own merit-based process;
- make the Transition Advisory Committee genuinely advisory;
- publish ministerial directions and quarterly reports;
- protect whistleblowers and public access to information;
- set a firm commencement date and a hard backstop on delays;
- give the Authority multi-year budget certainty.
The Minister has invited both sides to engage on the merits, and I accept. Our children deserve an Education Authority that is independent in fact, not just in name so let’s build that one.
- Victoria Cunningham, Opposition Senate Leader
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