SHADOW Tourism Minister David Dodwell says improved management and real investment in deteriorating public golf courses is badly needed ? not just a change of the Ministry in charge of them.

The United Bermuda Party (UBP) MP was commenting after the House of Assembly last week passed an Act that switched responsibility for the Government golf courses from the Ministry of Works & Engineering to Tourism.

Former European Tour professional golfer Kim Swan said he feared the switch represented a threat to the future of public golf. But Tourism and Transport Minister Ewart Brown said local golfers would not lose out to visitors.

"Why are they making this change?" Mr. Dodwell said yesterday. "The fault is with the Government and the fact they have not done enough with the golf courses through eight years of poor management.

"Moving it from one department to another will make no difference. The courses have published no annual reports since 1998, when the PLP came to power. And we have seen no financial statements since 2001.

"The Tourism Minister is admitting they've dropped the ball by saying, 'You can't do it, let me do it'. But he did not answer the question of how he's going to do it."

Mr. Dodwell supported the idea of keeping the marketing of golf courses to visitors as a responsibility of the Tourism Department, but he said the priority was to "fix the product" ? and that was a job for Works & Engineering.

"It's not a difficult problem to fix if we put the necessary money into it," he added. "The problem is that the PLP Government has not invested in the courses and that's why they are in their current state."

Management of the public golf courses was amalgamated in 1998 ? a decision made by the previous UBP Government. But Mr. Dodwell admitted that it may have been a wrong move and added that allowing each course to run itself might be a better way forward.

"I'm not sure it was the right thing to do to consolidate the courses," Mr. Dodwell said. "What we had before was trustees with great loyalty to their own course as well as healthy competition.

"I believe we have a good board in charge of the courses, but they need the support of Government to get the job done."

Like Sen. Swan, Mr. Dodwell feared the St. George's course might fall out of public ownership.

"I asked Dr. Brown that question two or three times before he gave an answer and he said there were no plans to do that 'at this time'. The 'at this time' part is what makes me suspect that there are things going on that we know nothing about."

Opposition Senate Leader Kim Swan, the former manager of St. George's Golf Course, said he feared the tradition of public golf in Bermuda could be jeopardised by the switch.

"I owe my chance to play professionally on the European Tour to the days when I was able to play public golf at Port Royal," Sen. Swan said. "Without that chance I could not have done it.

"I fear that the switch of the courses to Tourism will make public golf secondary to the needs of visitors.

"Of course, golf is an important part of our tourism product, but we need to strike a balance. We need to ensure that working-class people who live on the island and want to go for a round of golf can do it.

"It was not long ago that there was segregation on Bermuda's golf courses, but the game has come a long way. Now public golf is a great social leveller."

He said the Government's failure to realise the plans of several developers, who proposed a major tourism development at Morgan's Point with a world-class championship golf course, had allowed the island's golf tourism product to fall behind its competitors.

"Locals, including Sen. Swan, need never worry about the PLP Government excluding Bermudians from public golf courses," Dr. Brown said. "I know it must be difficult for the senator to have faith in our Government but as a member of Her Majesty's Opposition, he must wait and see."