19 May 2017
Yesterday’s ExCo meeting was held late in the afternoon with three items on the open agenda.
Council considered and approved exemptions for the Airport Contractors Vehicles on the Airport Access Road, after the end of the construction phase of the Airport Design Build Operate (DOB) contract. Council wanted to ensure that the vehicles were licensed and insured and that any damage caused to the road was repaired by the contractor.
Council also considered and approved a recommendation to seek submission to Her Majesty’s Government of a request to amend Section 21 of the St Helena, Ascension and Tristan da Cunha Constitution Order 2009, by the insertion of a new Section, Section 3A.
The intention behind this amendment to Section 3A is to allow prioritisation of persons with local status, in terms of employment and land holding, without breaching the protection against discrimination provision. Although legal advice was that the Constitution already allowed this, Council wanted it to be more specific.
Finally Council considered a recommendation from the Financial Secretary in respect of the exit strategy for St Helena Hotel Development Ltd. The paper from the Financial Secretary set out a number of principles to be adopted to allow SHG to withdraw as soon as practicable from ownership of the hotel. Council emphasised the importance of making the shares in the hotel available to local people first, before considering external investors. Given that the Council were asked to agree principles, the full strategy will now be worked up in line with Council’s wishes and subsequently published.
This being the final scheduled ExCo meeting before dissolution of Council at noon tomorrow, I thanked all Members who had contributed to ExCo over the past four years and agreed to read the ExCo report.
The meeting ended at 5.20pm.
ExCo
19 May 2017