Here’s the full text of Edwin Reyes’ Budget speech:

Mr Speaker,

This is my 11^th address to this House in what is known as the Budget Session and throughout all of these eleven addresses, on whatever side of the House I may be sat, my contributions under the section dedicated to Sports and Leisure have always been the most enjoyable at a personal level.

On sports related matters I wish to commence by saying that I am a firm believer in unity, where possible, for the benefit of Gibraltar’s greater interests. I am glad to see that Government continues with the long existing policy to assist all local sporting bodies to overcome any foreign Government’s politically inspired attempts to block our membership of international sporting bodies. The antics and shameful actions taken above all by our neighbours to the north are starting to wear thin and I pray that slowly but surely other Sports Governing Bodies will judge Gibraltar’s applications on their own merit and not allow themselves to be coerced by our neighbour’s unjustified and often unscrupulous arguments. In the recent past we Gibraltarians have rejoiced together in respect of landmark achievements namely; the acceptance of the Gibraltar Football Association as a full member of UEFA and then FIFA.   The policy of assisting other Sporting Associations will certainly continue to receive the Opposition’s wholehearted support and I sincerely wish other sporting associations, such as Rugby amongst others, all the very best in their continuing battles to obtain their respective international memberships which are rightfully and legitimately theirs.

The GSD Opposition wishes the Gibraltar Football Association all the very best in finally having its own National Stadium. It is particularly gratifying to hear that the Stadium will now definitely be sited at Victoria Stadium – a location first promoted by the GSD. It seems that where there is a will there is a way and, therefore, the GSD was not wrong from the outset in choosing the Victoria Stadium as the best site for an UEFA and FIFA fully approved facility.

The terms and conditions settled between Government and the GFA in agreeing upon a lease means that the GFA will become the custodians of our much loved Victoria Stadium and, therefore, we will offer our full support to the GFA in this respect because there has already been more than enough delays in ensuring “Home” matches are played at “Home” = namely within Gibraltar itself.

It was indeed a far more viable and attractive option for local sports lovers to attend and support our teams last week who were playing their first qualifying Home Matches for the season 2018/2019 in respect of the Champions League and Europa League Qualifications competitions.

I am sure this House is unanimous in wishing our teams participating within the Europa League all the best in their second leg games. Both Europa FC and Saint Joseph’s have so far attained a one all draw, so there is certainly everything to play for in their imminent games this week in order to obtain qualification onto the next stage.

Our representatives in the Champions League, namely Lincoln Red Imps FC, proudly gave local supporters a day to remember by winning their initial match in the qualifying preliminary round against La Fiorita Montegiardino from San Marino. However, despite a very commendable effort, luck did not accompany us and they lost the next match against Drita from Kosovo. We now wish the best of Gibraltarian luck to Lincoln Red Imps FC for their next forthcoming international game which will be within the Europa League setup.

The forthcoming developments at Victoria Stadium should see an improvement to football facilities in Gibraltar. However, despite the fantastic and ambitious project to be undertaken by the GFA and which will see the main pitch upgraded to an UEFA Category 4 stadium – all at the GFA’s expense through secured funding grants, there is still a great need for training facilities if our future generations are to aspire to improving their overall standards. It breaks my heart to see so many Gibraltar registered football teams having to go over into Spain in order to be able to train in preparation for local and international matches. Indeed, more facilities are very much needed if we are to continue to aspire progressing unto 2^nd rounds and beyond of the Qualification stages in respect of European Champions League and the Europa League.

The GSD continues to believe that alongside the new upgraded facility which will soon be enjoyed by the football fraternity there is still a great need for extensive training facilities in Gibraltar to cater for participants at all levels and in numerous sports. These facilities should ensure that the introduction and development of our youngsters into the world of sports, very often arising from our schools’ curriculum and sporting clubs’ commitments, are equally catered for. It is the duty of the Gibraltar Sports and Leisure Authority to make these facilities available for our general public at large who wish to partake in sporting activities.

The sixteen million pounds which become available to Government from the premiums paid by the GFA should be used wisely and in close consultation with all relevant sporting bodies across the board. This should ensure, as far as reasonably possible, that Gibraltar continues to produce worthy local athletes and develops its wide ranging sporting talents - often with results which make many of our sporting opponents in official competitions envious of our rather consistent good results.

Many Gibraltarians are currently heavily involved in carefully planned training sessions with the aspirations of proudly representing Gibraltar at the 2019 Island Games, which will for the second time in the Games history, be held in Gibraltar. I am sure I again speak for the whole House as we offer our collective best wishes to all forthcoming participants who, through their committed efforts, will hopefully yet again make us proud of our sporting fraternity.

New sporting facilities are currently under construction and planned to be completed in time for the 2019 Island Games. These facilities will serve Gibraltar beyond the Island Games itself and, therefore, it is essential that full consultation takes place with the pertinent sports governing bodies to ensure that the present and immediate future needs of the sporting fraternity in Gibraltar are met. The old Victoria Stadium Sports Hall now comes under the lease purchased by the GFA so it is essential that facilities hereto provided under this roof are re-provided in convenient locations. The Tercentenary Sports Hall itself has over the recent past proved extremely useful and popular to many sports participants and I wish the same degree of success in respect of the new facilities to be built. It is of utmost importance that the needs of sports participants are met in the new facilities being built.

With your leave Mr Speaker I would like to repeat the offer I made last year, as well as the year before that, during the Budget debate:

Although I am a firm believer that individual Sports Governing Bodies should be allowed to manage their own affairs with no political interference, I once again urge the Minister for Sports, in his capacity as Chairman of the Sports and Leisure Authority, to take a particular interest to ensure that publicly owned facilities are used in a fair manner for the benefit of all sports lovers. There is both a duty and moral obligation for the Sports Authority to ensure that, where desired by a club or individual citizen, membership in their relevant local Governing Body is open to all in an equal and fair manner. I offer myself to sit down and discuss with the Minister for Sports possible avenues which may be looked into in order to set up a special independent body tasked with matters pertaining to and requiring arbitration related to local sporting issues. Some disputes have been dragging on for far too long now and I am hopeful that by working together with all affected parties solutions can and should be found.

Mr Speaker, I wish to reaffirm my personal convictions that through the collective celebration of social events participating Gibraltarians contribute towards reinforcing our identity, culture and history as a people and a community. Both the performing and fine arts fraternities always prove themselves to be very proactive within their own specialised areas and I take this opportunity to congratulate all the groups and individuals who have done Gibraltar extremely proud through their international participations and, in numerous case, even top awards gained. It is always a personal and collective pleasure to be able to say how proud we are of the international achievements of our fellow Gibraltarians.

During their last term in Office Government purchased both the Queen’s Cinema and Queen’s Hotel sites for the development of a theatre and related activities. There are somewhat mixed feelings among the local community as to how these sites will be developed and at what cost.   Government announced through its 2015 Election Manifesto that a lot of progress on the design of the new Queen’s National Theatre had been made in order to make the old Queen’s Cinema a venue for touring productions. It went to say that now that preliminary land use designs had been finalised they would continue to work with the committee of local drama experts to finalise the internal designs and facilities required, alongside exploring the possibility of commercial use of the theatre complex facilities. This now seems to be yet another matter which still remains to be addressed shortly – whenever shortly may be. Could it be that after such a period of inactivity the Committee of local drama experts no longer exists?

Government has set aside in this year’s Estimates £2,100,000, in order to subsidise a two day Mega Concert. However, the forecast outturn for last year in respect of this event has turned out to be £4,400,000 and it is now confirmed that we had an actual expenditure of £3,485,441 for 2016/2017. Given the costs of running the Mega Concert of the last two years, I would love to know how this year it is estimated it will cost slightly less than half of what the 2017 Mega Concert turned out to be.

Coming back to the Queen’s Cinema site I sincerely hope that the development of this site will be real value for money and that our local culture, in the widest sense of the words, is enhanced. Local performers often may be heard to say that if we can afford so many millions for a two day event then surely our local performers, entertainers and audiences are entitled to ask for a theatre which is fit for purpose and available throughout the year.

Mr Speaker, moving onto Educational matters I wish to start by citing from a passage I very recently came across:

“Children must be able to play, study and grow in a peaceful environment. Woe to anyone who stifles their joyful impulse to hope!”

With this in mind I cannot stress enough the need to ensure we get it absolutely right when planning and building facilities which will serve our children’s educational purposes in preparation for adult life.

Much has been said in respect Government’s projects for the re-provision and expansion of our school buildings. For our pupils’ benefit I wish to recommend that decisions taken, or to be taken shortly, should be based above all upon feedback received from the professionals in the field – namely school teachers themselves. Unfortunately very recently, in fact only a month ago, the Gibraltar Teachers Association highlighted that to date they have felt ignored and not consulted on the majority of the education reforms that the Department of Education has embarked on.

Teachers, who wish to bring closure to the new school building debate, stressed that they continued to disagree with the project, citing the high levels of congestion in the Waterport area, the difficulty in evacuating the buildings in case of an emergency, the potential for unhealthy competition between the schools, difficulties in behaviour management and pastoral care, bullying, etc., as issues of grave concern which they hope that Government considers carefully in order to mitigate potential negative impact that collocation may have on the education and wellbeing of pupils.

Through feedback received from teachers I fully empathise with their frustration in that there is no forum or structure for the classroom professionals to share ideas, concerns or expertise in a meaningful way. Teachers go on to say that very little information has filtered down to them on plans to align Key Stages, introduce Vocational Education and provide a coeducational environment in the secondary sector.

I look forward to seeing how the Minister for Education, whom I am told acknowledged there had been an unfortunate disconnection between his Ministry and teachers and I sincerely hope he will address this issue in the immediate future with a view to making amends.

Given that teachers have reinforced the need for, and importance of, vertical communication on the current and future reforms in education I sincerely hope that their voices are heard if the vision being acted upon by Government is to succeed. Again I fully empathise with the teaching profession who on the issue of collocation feel a golden opportunity has been lost to explore different models within the constraints of the land available to achieve on optimum educational solution. Teachers feel that the issue is not just about what is being provided, but about what could have been produced had there been more meaningful consultation with classroom teachers themselves.

As both a teacher and a Past President of the Gibraltar Teachers Association, and someone who still has educational matters extremely close to his heart, I extend a recommendation to the Minister for Education to listen to and work as closely as possible with classroom teachers – albeit alongside his management teams. Classroom Teachers want to be part of any process that changes our education system and want to be involved in meaningful consultation before final decisions are taken, surely the way forward proposed by these professionals can only but contribute to the wellbeing and best possible future of our children – this is something which I hope we can all agree is paramount.

Through the latest feedback the Teachers Association have received we know that at present the majority of their members would be in favour of Key Stages alignments to coincide with the year in which pupils are scheduled to move from Lower to Upper Primary and, likewise, from Upper Primary to Secondary schools. These realignment seem to make logistical sense in respect of providing teaching and learning resources which the schools necessarily require.

I would like to take this opportunity to also recommend to the Minister that in their plans for building and resourcing of new schools careful consideration be given to current trends in respect of developments in schools’ curriculums. An example of this is the recent initiative already taken by one of our locally based private schools which now offers Computer Science at both GCSE and “A” Levels. It is courses like these which will serve to prepare today’s pupils to become the skilled workforce which Gibraltar will need tomorrow as the future will be dominated by digital technology.

Likewise, Mr Speaker, the GSD have raised the concept of modern apprenticeships in the past and we still believe we need to offer more in this field than we currently provide. Those pupils who do not wish to pursue an academic future need to be provided with the opportunity of a modern apprenticeship programme which, if properly structured, has the same standing as higher education. We need to create a gold standard for an apprenticeship programme so that employers have confidence in the system. The time for investment is now – not just in formal academic education leading towards entry into higher education, but also in the co-ordination of training and skills through vocational courses that carry international accreditation.

Mr Speaker, desiring only all the very best in respect of the forthcoming educational reforms I cannot but end by reinforcing that the views of the professionals in this field must be heard and acted upon. There is no better formula for success than to cultivate a sense of ownership amongst all tasked with the education of our children.

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