THE United Bermuda Party is prepared to draft a dummy bill to ensure better protection for rest home residents if Government does not step up to the challenge, Opposition Health Minister Louise Jackson claimed yesterday.

Insisting that "horrifying incident after horrifying incident" has occurred because insufficient legislation is in place, Mrs. Jackson said the time for Government to stop dragging its feet on the matter was long overdue.

"A very strong case has been made for the revising and updating of our residential homes regulations," she said. "I've been asking for this for at least three years.

"Every time there's an incident, there's a lacklustre response from the Health Minister. It's always, 'We're going to look into this'. Nothing ever happens. It's really starting to become a very urgent matter."

Mrs. Jackson's latest call for improved legislation was driven by an alleged sexual attack earlier this month on an 80-year-old male resident of a nursing home. An individual was arrested in connection with the alleged assault and the matter is now under police investigation.

Said the MP: "I send my sympathy to the family but I cannot comment directly on the matter because the case is before the courts. What I will say is our regulations need to be revised, expanded and updated.

"How long are we going to wait for some action on this? How much more has to happen? If the PLP (Progressive Labour Party) Government don't want to write regulations we will do it for them."

She recalled a scenario from last year when the Shadow Health Minister at the time, Michael Dunkley, put a dummy bill before Parliament to tackle public smoking and the sale of tobacco to persons younger than 18.

"We can't put forward legislation as an Opposition but we can put it forward in another way," she said, adding that Mr. Dunkley's draft paved the way for regulations now in place.

"They seem to be dragging their feet. The Minister of Health & Family Services said she would look into the regulations. Nothing's been done. I think we need something concrete and I think we need something now.

"I don't understand what is the hold up ? there are people who are already employed in Government to write regulations. There's obviously no will there for this Minister to get on with it. We see horrifying incident after horrifying incident because the regulations in place now only speak to the licensing of premises that are used for rest homes."

Absent from the legislation are matters of basic care ? regulations governing the hiring of staff, standards of care for seniors, staff certification and other basic matters, she said.

"There is no regulation for either Government or private homes," she said. "Some do a wonderful job but others need help and it falls to the responsibility of this Government to protect the people in rest homes."

The Shadow MP highlighted Lefroy House and the fact that it still has a hole in its roof nearly three years after the fault was caused by Hurricane Fabian, as an example of Government's lack of interest.

She also criticised the level of care in a nursing home mentioned in the Budget Debate as having reduced the number of falls suffered by its residents from 18 to eight in the past year.

"It's still a disgrace," she said, taking care not to mention the home by name. "If rest homes are properly monitored, there should be no falls at all.

"If you're running a rest home with qualified staff and the proper equipment ? which many of these homes do not have ? to deal with seniors you don't have any falls.

"I don't know what else has to happen before something is done here. I get calls from the public all the time. People are concerned because it affects everybody, not just the people in the homes but their families and friends ? people who are getting older and realise they might one day be placed in a home."

Health Minister Patrice Minors did not respond to questions.