 We have designated 2023 as the Year of the Youth, and so what we've done is we've started April to pretty much kickstart the Year of the Youth. We had some issues with Commonwealth because we had to attend a meeting in Pakistan, Pakistan had severe flooding so that was postponed, we were supposed to as a Commonwealth launch the Year of the Youth together but that has not happened and so we are using April pretty much as a springboard and we are going to continue with activities throughout the year. So what we've had so far, we've had the Easter summer camp, the Easter camps throughout some of the communities. We started with prayer and worship on the square because we truly knew that this is what was most needed by our young people. We have activities ongoing throughout the different communities to commemorate Youth Month. But what we will see is the annual Parliament. Let me start again because there was so much going on. There was so much going on. There was so much going on. What was melting? You said Parliament. Yes, yes, yes. So this year we see that Commonwealth has designated 2023 to be the Year of the Youth. And so most of our activities are channeled through the year. April would have been the month that we would have started simply because there were delays coming away from Commonwealth because of a meeting that was scheduled for January to ensure that all of Commonwealth started at the same time. But we've gone with our program, we started with prayer and worship on the square. We had our Easter camps throughout different communities. And we also have different activities ongoing in communities like Souffre, Grosjele and other constituencies. Parliament, Youth Parliament is coming up very soon. So I'm very excited about what young people will have to say for Youth Parliament. And the whole thrust is to have more frequent Youth Parliament. So we'll see later on in the year another Youth Parliament as opposed to in times past we only have one Youth Parliament. We believe that we need to give young people the opportunity to speak more. And so this government is definitely giving them that opportunity. So for the Year of the Youth and for this year our focus is on the fight against crime. So most of the thematic areas you will see will be the other end to that. We're expecting to have a dance competition later on. You'll see in the ministry and collaborate with the SLFE to bring out some messages as it put in to fighting against crime. And so I think that we're heading in the right direction and more things will be happening as the year goes by. So the Youth Connect is still a USA funded programme. But what about the other two initiatives, Cary Cypio and the other one? Yes, so all of these programmes are ongoing. As a matter of fact, we've heard some statements by the opposition indicating that nothing has gone on with you. First and foremost, it's absolutely fallacious for anybody who's a former Prime Minister to not understand the way things actually materialise but as it pertains to the ministry of youth development and sports and where funding comes from. Most of our projects are funded from the National Law Tree's authority. And so you may not necessarily see it reflected in the budget but it doesn't mean that things have not been done. We launched Scale 758, a platform that allows young people to go on to provide information on their CVs, job searchers and job seekers, employers, employees to connect. We identified that as one of the major issues for young people not getting job opportunities. And so this is a major activity we had. We had an official launch. It was televised, it was all over the place. So for anybody to indicate that nothing has happened with you, it either speaks to somebody who's not paying attention to young people or somebody who's just been disingenuous about the realities of what's happening. I mean, the Youth Economy Agency, there's a huge collaboration between the Youth Economy Agency and the Ministry of Youth Development and Sports. I mean, we've mentioned the fact that we're going to be semi-professionalising football and that is just not a football initiative because we bring in young people who are into photography, into videography, into other aspects of sports, physiotherapy, into the actual thrust to do things. We actually, from this year, we actually started an alternative sports season. Now, though it is called an alternative sports season, there's a reason why there's a twinning between youth and sports because in the alternative sports, you will see things like chess. You will see things like people who are into BMX riding. You will see things like off-roaders. You will see people that are into some sound clashes. These things are done by young people. So, at the end of the day, despite the fact that the nomenclature includes sports for any prime minister or former prime minister to indicate that nothing has been done in youth towards youth development, not only is that laughable, but it speaks to a desperation to find something on a minister that is grounded in youth development for so many years. And so, I think we are heading in the right direction. Can more be done? Yes. Will more be done? Yes. And so, I look forward to other activities for the year of the youth, and I think all of Saint Lucia will be very satisfied with what we are doing. Yours, but mine, I did. Yeah, Mr. Minister, we noticed that especially in the last couple of weeks, young Saint Lucia athletes have been showing, but what about the sustainability of these athletes? We know some of them, as soon as they drop out of school, if they don't have a scholarship, is there some kind of base, the base over that we keep the students in record and try to push them into? That's perhaps the best question I've received all year, or perhaps the best question I've ever received as a minister of youth for the last 19 months. Simply because anybody who has that question says to me that they understand the biggest difficulty facing sports development in Saint Lucia. Simply because it has never been addressed by any government. The biggest challenge for any sports minister, and if you follow sports development in Saint Lucia, we have the best athletes in the world from ages 19 and below. So if you look at any sort of measure of, let's just say per capita, of sports athletes in the world, between the age of one day to 19 years, Saint Lucia has produced some of the best in the world. The challenge for Saint Lucia is when those school leavers, or these individuals, leave school between 18, 19, and they enter into the work world. That is when they become less competitive on a global stage. That is an absolute fact, and I can give you a myriad of names of persons who captain West Indies did character very well, who were absolutely outstanding from the ages of, let's just say 12 to 19, and fell by the wayside. The answer to your question is that we must in Saint Lucia develop a high performance program. We have the capacity to do so. We've had many conversations on how we can do so. As a minister of sports, I can say that I have my disappointments in terms of the pace at which we've graduated or gravitated towards having a high performance program in Saint Lucia, but this is the way we can actually grab those young talents, nurture all aspects of their life, because now we are speaking about the nutrition, we are speaking about the compensation, we are speaking about the athletic abilities by way of weight training, physiotherapy, psychology, and there is an area, a one-stop area, that we can develop this high performance, and that is at the Sports Academy. To be clear, I as sports minister have said before coming in and will say and continue to see that it is a disservice to youth and sports development to spend anywhere in excess of $2 million and 20 athletes as opposed to spending that money on a high performance program, for those individuals we know have the talent at 17, 18, and 19 that we let go into the work world in the hotels that cannot be part of a high performance program that is trained appropriately to get the physiotherapy and the psychology that they need. It is a disservice to these athletes if at the end of the day we continue to gravitate towards a sports academy as opposed to a high performance program. Beach football, that's the professional line. You've been following closely. We initiated the first, pretty much the first step in beach football development in St. Lucia, as you correctly said. St. Lucia won a global medal, a gold medal in beach football at the under-17 level, and again it speaks to what happens from that age on because I had a picture sent to me of that under-17 team and where are they now? That was before my time, but I did have to ask myself that question. On the Easter weekend you would have seen the first ever Northern beach football competition with all indications. It was an absolute blast. The expectation is to spread beach football north, south, east and west. I've had conversations with the president of the St. Lucia Football Association, Mr. Cooper, on ensuring that we have more beach football, considering that we are surrounded by the sea and sand. And so we continue to have those conversations. We continue to liaise with some of the national trust and other areas that we can actually have those competitions because venue would be very important. We're able to use the Pigeon Island area from all indications, of course, with the music and the ambiance. It was successful, but we certainly hope that we spread it throughout St. Lucia, have a program that is sustained so that we can actually start exporting some of our beach footballers. I am sure, folks, that most of you are aware that the United Workers Party and more particularly Alan Shastney has been circulating a host of videos, presumably indicating that the land at Tapion was sold at a given price. I had reason rather to go on Alan Shastney's page. And when I saw the posting, I was flabbergasted. He posted that a given parcel of land, parcel 11, which was valued at some $6.5 million, was the land that we had allegedly sold. What picked my interest is that there were two renowned quantity surveyors in question. One who did the valuation in 2013 and one who did the current valuation. And basically I felt that two professionals could not have had such a vast difference in value for the same piece of vacant property known as parcel 11. One was 6.5 and the other 3.5. So we commenced our investigations. At the registry, there is no parcel at this point known as parcel 11. Parcel 11, which is the valuation which Alan Shastney showed, is no longer in existence. And I'll tell you what it is. Parcel 11 was a combination of parcel 50 and 51, which currently exists. In 2014, what is called a mutation or it is colloquially called a subdivision was done. This made parcel 11 no longer existent and it grew into two parcels, 50 and 51. What Alan Shastney dissentfully did, he took the valuation for the combined parcels when they were together known as parcel 11 and he purported this to have been the valuation of parcel 50, which was essentially a subset of parcel 11. Like I said, it's been nine years, parcel 11 has not been in existence. Parcel 11 was subdivided into two, parcel 50 and 51. 50 was sold and 51 is still vested in the National Housing Corporation. It stays on the ground. So all the videos, all the allegations, the scandal and everything else was premised on a lie. His actions, in my view, were fraudulent. His actions were deceitful. His actions were dishonest, not to mention reprehensible. And I'm calling on the leader of the opposition to issue an apology to the people of this country whom he quite glaringly attempted to deceive. In the house, I've already asked the speaker to make his valuation a document of the house and I will insist that he does. If he does not, I will ask that it be referred to the privileges committee again because we as a people cannot be represented by persons who seek to deceive us for political power. All right, let me just tell you. There was one big piece of land. It was subdivided into two. One is known as parcel 50, which is what was sold. One is known as parcel 51, which is retained by the seller. He took the valuation of the combined 50 and 51, which nine years ago existed together as parcel 11. Parcel 11, if you go to the registry, no longer exists. So in a surreptitious and deceitful way, he attempted to make persons believe that the valuation for the entire thing was the valuation for parcel 50, which was sold. Both of them, definitely. It's almost a mile away from the port of castries. You have to drive literally from the port. You drive onto the top road into Tapion and it is opposite where we call the madhouse or the old wellness center, converging on the sea by a cliff. In fact, there are several incidents of accidents, one which recently was fatal. Definitely not. And one of the things I want to say as well, if you look directly opposite that land, all of it was owned by NTC as well. It borders with the sea. All of it was sold by the very institution National Housing Corporation. It was sold at $2.7 million, which makes it in excess of $25 a square foot. Personally, I would not buy it. I would not buy it as a developer because you see the cost of rehabilitation of that land is quite high. But if you have the relevant ability to militate against the topography that currently exists, it can be made into good property. But as it stands now, if you visit it, there are lots of pictures I showed. I can send some pictures to you for dissemination. If it were me, I would never buy it. That is correct. There is also the situation where the ex-prime minister had given NTC a directive to buy land at the Calvary. And I spoke to several persons who are developers, and they are saying that this can be made into very nice land. But the cost of developing it, the amount of retaining walls that one would have to build makes it an investment that you really don't want to undergo because it will attract prices of between $40 and $50 a square foot given the magnitude of the infrastructural work that would have to be affected to make it a viable project. And that is the same as over there. No, let me correct that first. NTC did not deliver that verdict. It's a verdict that anyone can see through their eyes. The building is in a structurally unsound situation. Persons, the occupants are in harm's way. And NTC's consideration and sole consideration is the safety of the occupants. And in that regard, I mean, you have windows falling on a daily basis. You have pieces of concrete just falling on a daily basis. Not too long ago on a Saturday I was called, we had to put some more props, iron props, to uphold the balcony which is on the upper floor. So those are the kinds of exigencies that lend to persons probably being hurt. And we do believe that in the course of doing business the safety of the occupants is of paramount importance. And it is against that background, we decided that we can no longer have persons living under such conditions that at any time with the slightest of earthquakes, that building can collapse and lend to loss of life, possibly. Okay, the situation is that we would not have, I know, contrary to media reports and that's the other thing, the media always runs with fake news. You know, look at, look at, and that's true. I mean, let's face it, sometimes, some time ago the media confronted me with a fake piece of news in relation to a posting by United Park. What do you expect? You don't expect anything of substance that is true coming from those persons' mouths. So, you know, you just, you just, I don't make it newsworthy. However, as it relates to the CDC, what we did was we want to ensure we are taking it on a case-by-case basis, but we have written to persons, you will not believe that some of the CDCs, the persons in whose names the CDCs are registered, live in the US, live in England, who is using the CDC as a storage area, has a house of capacity and have a store in town, all sorts of things are happening because you have a situation where those CDCs go for as little as $145 a month in the middle of the city. So, who does not want to avail themselves to that kind of facility within the vicinity of the city? So, you know, there is reluctance in giving it up, but we have done our investigations and what we have found is that there are enough situations that lend themselves to getting persons who do not reside there, getting the leases terminated for occupancy by those persons who are vulnerable and are in harm's way. So, a lot of them have been written to. They have been given 30 days to vacate, after which we will take it from there. But rest assured, as it relates to those residents, we will do everything that is reasonably possible to ensure that there is a smooth transition of them to another comfortable area. Thank you very much. Okay, last one. You said, any city deliver verdict. Now you change your mind. Okay, good. How soon? Okay, but as I explained to you, we gave 30 days notice that that period is not up yet. It is only after the period is up. We know that most persons will comply and whatever difficulty the residue of the residents, we will take care of them on a kiss-by-kiss basis. But this building is a mark for demolition in the not-to-distant future. The beside of by saying that the situation that currently confronts our country from a security standpoint is unfortunate. It is one that we are deeply concerned about as an administration. Every life that is lost is one too many. And the government will spend no effort to ensure that we deploy all the resources at our disposal to fight in crime and criminality in this country. I know there have been attempts by some in the society to politicize this. Crime is not something to be politicized because at the end of the day, crime affects every facet of society. And in order for us to really get to the bottom of the situation as it obtains now, we need all hands on deck. And it is not just the government of Zanusha that must come forward and put forward all the solutions to the current situation as it relates to criminality in this country. There's a role for the opposition. There's a role for civil society organizations. There's a role for the family. Parents have a role in terms of how they orient their children. And that is the only way we will have long-term and durable solutions to fight in crime. Crime is a social construct. And for us as a government, we've appreciated and we've understood that in the fight against crime, it takes a lot more than just the deployment of law enforcement personnel. And that is why at every effort we have attempted to roll out social programs that will help the situation as it obtains in communities, particularly those communities where there tend to be a prevalence of criminal activity. It has to be a multi-pronged approach from here. Yes, we will deploy the police and the law enforcement personnel. The benefits of that would be short term, but the more long-term interventions they have to happen at the level of the church, at the level of the school, at the level of the family. And that is why we are currently in the budget process ensuring that the amount would have allocated for social programs in the past have been increased. And we're hoping that when agencies like the Ministry of Education, the Department of Equity begin to roll out their programs, we will touch families and we will be able to impact vulnerable communities in a more profound way that will eventually lead to a decrease in the criminality that seems to be taking our country by storm at the moment. It's important that these interventions are made early in the lives of the children who denounce wrong at a very early age. A simpler concept as it is, children have to be able to discern right from wrong. And if as adults we do not admonish children for the wrong that they do, they feel comfortable violating the guidelines that would be put in place for them in the home and even at school. And one thing I would say to students when I address them at assembly is that you break the school rule today and the consequences based on what form of punishment that the principal of the Dean of Discipline deemed necessary. When you graduate out of Form 5 and you are in society and you break the rules of society, it will no longer be the principal, but it will be the magistrate and the judge that you have to face, the police officer. So if at a very early age at the level of the preschool, the infant school and the primary school, we are able to teach them right from wrong and get them to understand that there is meriting conformity, especially in a social setting, we would be doing we would be doing a lot for our country in terms of creating a mindset that would cause these children to grow up and be responsible citizens. Well, as we speak, I have been discussing that matter with Dr. Pastor Kios Alfred, who is paired, you know, leading that charge on behalf of the Adventist Church. I think it's a very noble initiative. It is one that the government can identify with and I have given him a commitment as the Minister of Education that we will be working with the SD emission to ensure that the benefits that can be derived from such a program would be impacting schools across the country. Let me say that the SDH is not the only faith-based organization that is helping in the fight against crime. Only yesterday we saw hundreds of Roman Catholics, of course, led by the Archbishop himself taking to the streets of Euphot, with a view to sensitizing the community to the need for a more peaceful and more engaging environment in Euphot where people can return to the things that they would have done prior to the scourge that we saw in Euphot. So I want to take the opportunity to commend all the faith-based organizations that are helping in the fight against crime. As I said earlier, the fight against crime takes a lot more than just the deployment of law enforcement personnel. We have to continue engaging the populace. We have to continue the dialogue. And we have to make social interventions the results of which we may not be able to realize tomorrow, but down the road, I am sure those would impact us very positively as communities and as a country speaking holistically. That's a short question. We've seen in recent years, even recently, that there have been a string of school shootings in the United States. Children in Portugal and the behavior from that region. Is there any program in place or anything that the government or Ministry of Education is working on to ensure that this behavior does not reach out to us? I mean, God forbid that we would have to deal with one of those situations anytime soon. What I can tell you is that we've always taken school security very, very seriously. We have realized in the Ministry of Education that we do not have sufficient personnel, not just in terms of numbers, but expertise to lead the charge on our own as far as school security is concerned. And it is against that backdrop we were able to bring in Mr. Osbert Regis, retired police commissioner to help with the security apparatus of the school system. And his mandate would include more than just the safety of children whether they are on the road and in the classroom, but in addition to the school plan. And very importantly the extent to which we can have our students and teachers operate within a safe environment during the school day. But as I said, it would be a very sad day if we had to deal with what we see happening with such alarming regularity in the schools of the US. But we're taking nothing for granted. We are living no stone on turn to the confines of the resources we have at our disposal. We are doing our best to ensure that the entire school security situation as we know it is one that we stay on top of. And we will continue to provide a safe and secure environment for both our teachers and students so that the learning process can be facilitated. Our children will get the education that they rightfully deserve and they will grow up to become productive citizens in Central Asia.