Unbiased look at the Sint Maarten Elections
PHILIPSBURG:--- Minister of Social Affairs Cornelius de Weever announced on Wednesday at the Council of Ministers weekly press briefing that the Department of Social Affairs will pay the St. Peters Community Council for six weeks for the fire victims that sought shelter there. "All other statements by persons who claim they made the payments are false and untrue statements."He said that is enough time for the Ministry of VROMI to seek proper and affordable social homes for the fire victims. Minister de Weever further stated that it was under his leadership the Crisis Care Policy was developed and is being executed, therefore he cannot sit by and allow politicians to undermine the hard work of the civil servants at his Ministry. De Weever said that care plans were made up for all the families after the necessary information was gathered from the other stakeholders. He said he chose to repeat this procedure because he does not believe any other Minister should try to take away the hard work and effort made by the care providers for the St. Peters fire victims especially when none of it falls under their Ministry.
Short Term Contract Drama Continues --- SER took 14 months to issue advice on NA proposed Legislation, one month to Advise DP on their Proposal.
Minister De Weever who is also responsible for labor brought up the draft amendment of the civil code that will address the abuse of short term labor contracts, maternity leave and employment agencies. Minister de Weever said that he pointed out very clearly that the SER gave a negative advice on the proposed legislation the National Alliance faction submitted in Parliament. He said he personally asked Parliament to give him time because he wanted to tackle the matter in a holistic manner. He admitted several times that the draft legislation took some time but now that is approved it's only a matter of time before it goes into law and what happened to the Pelican workers will not happen again.SMN News asked the Minister of Labor and Social Affairs who appointed the members of the SER, Minister de Weever said he could not remember. When he was asked when the National Alliance did submitted their draft legislation to Parliament Minister De Weever said the NA submitted their draft legislation on June 6th, 2011. When asked when did the SER submit their advice, he said that advice was given on September 14th, 2012 (14 months after it was submitted).When asked when the DP submitted their new draft, the Minister said on May 29th, 2014 and the SER issued their advice on a much broader draft that included much more on June 29th, 2014.It is clear that the SER held up the draft legislation to amend the civil code for more than one year seemingly because it was submitted by the opposition while they managed to approve the one submitted by the political party (or coalition government) that appointed them in one month.
