Paget East MP the Hon. John Stubbs, who came face-to-face with a life-threatening disease four weeks ago, returned to the House of Assembly yesterday with a message of hope and renewal for Bermuda.

Special arrangements were made for the wheelchair-bound veteran MP to speak to fellow Parliamentarians, who greeted him with applause and handshakes.

The 60-year-old Dr. Stubbs, who had cancerous tumours removed from his spine at the end of January, was carried by friends and helpers up the Sessions House steps. His wife Robin was at his side.

Dr. Stubbs told MPs his four-week stay in a Boston hospital had given him time to "think hard about the Country's future''.

And while there was much good the Island had accomplished, there was much that threatened its future well-being.

In particular, he saw racial division, free-spending habits and over-building as dangers.

Dr. Stubbs said it was vital that MPs use their leadership position to set Bermuda-first examples for the rest of society to follow.

He called for an end to the corrosive "politics of envy'' and for an end to the spend-now, pay-later mindset that endangers future generations.

Politicians had to change.

"Around the world, of all cultural groups, the proclivity of politicians to spend is appalling,'' he said.

Bermudian politicians, like Bermuda society, had been seduced by 21 decades of steadily increasing incomes to think it was a birthright and that sound planning for the future was unnecessary.

In both the public and private sectors, he said, "we've spent money like drunken sailors''.

But the recession has made Bermudians "recognise the land of make believe we were living in''.

Dr. Stubbs saw the new Budget's plan for a fund to save money each year to pay for capital projects as a step in the right direction.

But he went further to recommend the creation of a "Bermuda Fund'' which would save money for the Country and be owned by all.

The fund could be a unifying dynamic and help the Island avoid the financial pitfalls that were seriously damaging national economies around the world.

Dr. Stubbs predicted the Island's recovery from recession would be slow and painful. The recession was not a simple economic dip but a phenomenon that saw massive restructuring in world economies.

Bermuda tourism would continue to pay the price, he said. The higher-income market that Bermuda aims for was experiencing "extensive disquiet'' and "fears that something might happen to them''.

Dr. Stubbs also predicted a "dismal future'' unless Bermudians got together and stopped overbuilding. The Island could not possibly continue as it has. A "serious curtailment'' was necessary.

Dr. Stubbs said improved race relations was essential for a better and sound economy.

"Without it the future prosperity of Bermudians is indeed sorely circumscribed,'' he said.

He said the "slow advance to understanding'' between blacks and whites had been one of his great professional disappointments.

He was particularly critical of the fact there were so few social friendships between the races.

"There are very few Bermudians who are truly emancipated,'' he said. "Many have major hang-ups in this regard. They are refusing to face reality, and what a corrosive effect it has.

"You can't legislate amity, but you can lead by example. Continued divisiveness will heap upon us a tragedy we will all share.'' Dr. Stubbs suggested the creation of a centre at Bermuda College to study issues of race. The academic setting, he said, would depoliticise the subject and promote new understandings.

Without close friends of the other race, Dr. Stubbs said, people "won't know what's happening or the cultural enrichment they're missing''.

BACK ON TOP -- The Hon. John Stubbs was all smiles yesterday when he was carried into the House of Assembly, just four weeks after a serious cancer operation.