A senior UBP MP this week admitted in a speech to the Rotary Club that his party had not yet managed to convince the electorate that it could be a viable alternative to the current Government.

The ruling Progressive Labour Party was also failing the people, said Shadow Legislative Affairs Minister John Barritt in a speech entitled "Third Party Politics (or pass the pliers, they're downsizing democracy)''.

He said voter disenchantment with the performance of the Island's politicians was one reason why talk of a new political party had surfaced in recent weeks.

Mr. Barritt emphasised that he had no idea how the speculation started, or who might be involved. "For all I know it may have been one of my own colleagues,'' he said.

But, he said, there was an "emerging majority'' whose aspirations "find echo in... what a third party could represent.''.

"I am not so naive to believe disaffection in the community is simply confined to Government. "The UBP as Opposition also comes in for its fair share of criticism too,'' he told his audience.

"Just as the PLP has had and continues to have its challenges in governing after 30 years as Opposition, so we in the UBP continue to wrestle with our new and unfamiliar role of Opposition ... which requires not just that we be sharp and vocal critics of the Government but that we present as a viable alternative when the next election rolls around.'' Island voters, said Mr. Barritt, wanted "a change in the way our parliamentarians conduct themselves in undertaking the country's business.'' He said there had been "hope for change'' after the November 1998 General Election.

"The blame game has become a permanent feature here as elsewhere ... Now that we have had a change of Government blaming the other guy or the other side has become not only the best offence of a decision under scrutiny, but the best offence.

"The future beckons and yet we appear to be driven, confined and trapped by the baggage of perceptions that applied in the past,'' he said.

Mr. Barritt added that it was significant that results of a recent poll indicated that 84 percent of registered voters supported a representative conference on constitutional change that included all interested parties not just political parties.

The ruling party was intent on "downsizing democracy'' with its proposals to reduce the number of MPs, said Mr. Barritt.

"Reducing the numbers make greater power possible, subtraction will not be addition. It will diminish not enhance democracy in Bermuda. We will be less likely to have a parliament that is representative of all the voices in the community.'' And he reiterated his party's position that Bermudians should have the final say on the number of seats by way of a referendum.

Mr. Barritt finished his speech by criticising the new voter registration system which has eliminated the annual registration but requires people to notify the registrar when they move.

The Devonshire South MP said that contrary to what the PLP had promised, the new system was more expensive and could end up disenfranchising hundreds, if not thousands, of people.

"It permits the development and maintenance of an out of date Parliamentary Registrar,'' he later told The Royal Gazette . "And without effective scrutiny we could have people in the hundreds literally voting where they don't live or haven't lived for years, but electing to stay registered in their old constituency because they simply don't know or worse they know and figure because it's a marginal area my vote is more important or crucial in the old constituency rather than in my new home constituency.'' John Barritt jOH