After former Progressive Labour Party Senator Ira Philip angered Opposition United Bermuda Party delegates at the opening session of the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association conference on Monday, Shadow Legislative Affairs Minister John Barritt was given the chance to reply -- and to speak on "Parliament, the Member and the Media''.

I am particularly pleased to have this opportunity to speak to your today on behalf of the Opposition United Bermuda Party, notwithstanding how this opportunity has arisen. In fact, because we are aware of how it came about, I hope my pleasure will not be met with your displeasure.

I am also pleased that this opportunity has fallen to me on the topic "Parliament, the Member and the Media''. It may interest you to know that before I entered politics -- which was after I took up law -- I was a working journalist in Bermuda for almost ten years, having started as a cub reporter in my early teens during school holidays in the 1960s and by the time I finished up in 1980 I was a parliamentary reporter and radio talk show host.

It with that background that I stand before you today as spokesman for the Opposition.

Like most politicians I came from the "let's be reasonable'' school of politicians. You are all familiar with that expression I expect. Be reasonable. Which on its face seems perfectly, well, reasonable. Trouble is when we break down what is reasonable we often find that what people really mean is: "Be reasonable. Do it my way''. Or "be reasonable. See it my way.'' Of course we don't all see things the same way -- and there begins the problem. A problem that surfaces not just in politics but in all forms of human endeavour and human relationships, and perhaps most especially in the relationship between the press and politicians.

Let's start with November 9, 1998 in Bermuda. Election day. Since that date you were told on Monday: "The old grey mare ain't what she used to be.'' True. We had a change in government for the first time in 30 years -- that is since the advent of political parties, the introduction of universal adult suffrage and the adoption of the Bermuda Constitution. the Progressive Labour Party, the perennial opposition since its formation in 1963, finally assumed power. It was, they say, a "landslide victory''.

A landslide victory? Well, if you judge landslide by the number of seats, they won 26 of the 40, eight more then the 18 they won in the 93 election. In terms of the popular vote, they won that majority with 53 percent of the vote; the Opposition United Bermuda Party ended up with 14 seats having captured 45 percent of the total vote. You might think that a good and obviously significant swing, but a landslide? I suspect that while you have been here this week you have heard a little about proposed electoral reform. The Progressive Labour party which was so handsomely rewarded in 1998 wants to move from 20 dual-seat constituencies to single seat constituencies. They won't say at this stage how many -- just that they want a reduction in the number of MPs and single seat constituencies of the same size to -- they say -- give effect to the principle "one man one vote of equal value'' and thus, they say, "enhance democracy'' in Bermuda by reducing the number of MPs.

They add fuel to the argument -- as you heard on Monday -- by charging that the UBP remained in power over 30 years because they "gerrymandered'' the voting districts. It's a charge that has played well in some quarters and on the face of it you might think the argument proven when you learn that some constituencies with half as many voters as another returns the same number of MPs.

No question that needs to be addressed.

What we currently have is a holdover from the days when voters elected their representatives by parish -- and each parish had 4 until 1968 when it was agreed that Pembroke the most populated parish should have eight. But those were also the days when segregation in this country, when until 1968 you only had a vote if you owned land, and then if you owned land in each parish you had the plus vote, and what resulted is just what you would expect. A black population that by and large lived and grew up in certain neighbourhoods and who were deprived for the longest time of the right, free and unrestricted, to fully participate in the government of this country.

There was an oligarchy and they were white.

But with the start of party politics in 1963, and the advent of universal adult suffrage in 1968, things started to change. The United Bermuda Party burst on the political scene and captured the Government in the 1968 election determined to eliminate all forms of segregation and committed to the promotion of racial integration. As the name suggests, the United Bermuda Party has always prided itself on being first and foremost a bi-racial party not just in name but in membership and candidates for office.

Bermuda society did change -- profoundly -- under the United Bermuda Party.

And for the better for whatever our disagreements over the change, one thing is obvious we have all been able to pride ourselves, even sell ourselves, on our stability.

Change continues and now we are being asked to embark on electoral reform.

But before we rush to the alternative, I ask you to pause for a moment. Look at the table of election results in the booklet you received earlier this week entitled "The 375th Anniversary of Parliamentary Institutions in Bermuda 1995'', page 27.

If you look closely you will immediately recognise two things -- whatever the imperfections of dual seat constituencies in Bermuda: 1. No party has ever won the Government without the majority popular vote; and 2. The number of seats each party has won seems near enough to reflect the popular support they received at the polls.

I say near enough because they are not quite exact. In this regard, it might interest you to know that it was the now Opposition, but then Government, United Bermuda Party, which 20 years ago proposed electoral reform to truly give effect to the principle `one person, one vote of equal value'. It was back at our last constitutional conference in 1979. The UBP recommended Proportional Representation by the Single Transferable Vote - PR-STV as it is known. It was rejected by the Progressive Labour Party. Too complicated - and maybe it was 21 years ago. The UBP sure abandoned it quickly enough. But maybe it's a system whose time has finally come... but hey, I won't go there today, in this forum.

But in 1998, under the system the PLP says is "gerrymandered'', they won.

They did it in my view because... they appear to have moved to "the centre'' over the years, and "the centre'' shifted some towards them. I stress the "appeared'' and leave it at that. The proof as they say is always in what you do for the people and to the people once you are in power.

To use Mr. Philip's words: the so-called PLP rebels became the emperors.

Carefully chosen words, I presume.

What they also assumed was stewardship of a relatively successful economy. I say "relatively'' because for a jurisdiction our size, 20 square miles in the North Atlantic pond, we are to most outsiders an economic marvel. Of course, you don't have to take my word for it. You have seen proof of it I suspect with your own eyes; you have heard with your own ears. I can sure you it didn't happen in the last two years. It also didn't just happen. Successive United Bermuda Party governments played an important role in ensuring this success.

Is it all peaches and cream? Was everyone happy? No and no.

Tourism, once the major industry in these islands and generator of jobs -- first jobs, second job and third jobs for some -- has slipped badly and now ranks behind international business which relies on skilled talent, sometimes highly skilled, to meet the challenge of fierce global competition.

The UBP was pummelled for presiding over the decline in tourism. Two years later, despite the promises, the decline continues. Like other offshore centres, we also face the on-going challenge of financial regulation posed by the OECD.

Important issues? You bet -- especially when they hit in the wallet.

There are other issues too, for Bermudians -- probably not unlike those you face in your own countries -- law and order, crime, affordable housing, education and the growing expense of health care.

Are we tackling them successfully? The Government likes to think so. The Opposition likes to think not. So what else is news? And thus I turn to the Press to whom we the politicians turn to report what we think or rather what we say we think or perhaps, in some cases, what we think we say.

You heard earlier this week that the Press is regarded by some in the PLP as "the unofficial Opposition''. I am going to suggest to you that it is perhaps not surprising that the press might be viewed that way by the Government. Or any Government for that matter. Including the UBP when we were in power. I mean if the press were our allies and our friends, who did what we told them, they sure had a funny way of showing it, stabbing us not in the back but the belly with their daily reports of our mistakes and our errors during our last term in office.

The problem with the Press is this: They just don't report what we want them to report in the way we want them to report it. Sound familiar? The pesky Press are always asking questions. Sometimes at the most inconvenient times and sometimes with questions for which we don't have the answer, or with questions we don't want to answer. And they don't often take "no comment'' for an answer -- although they will report that if that's all you have to say.

Is that right? Is that fair? I think to answer that question you have to ask: What role do we expect the Press to play in a free and democratic society? Is it simply to report what parliamentarians have to say verbatim, ad nauseum, to serve as passive cheerleaders on the sidelines? Or do we expect them to ask questions and probe what they are told and report fairly and accurately what they are told? I submit that it is the latter -- as uncomfortable as they makes me feel sometimes when I am the object of their attention; or as disappointed as I am on occasion when I read or listen to what I am reported to have said.

But my discomfort and my disappointment, which I suspect is common to all politicians from time to time, is the price of a Free Press, a strong Press, which is an essential and critical component of any society which calls itself free and democratic.

Do I think they can do a better job? You bet. In the rush to be first with a story, in the rush to obtain the better angle, there seems to me a growing tendency to sensationalise -- and falling by the way side is the primary duty to inform other than to opine and entertain on the events and issues of the day. Meanwhile, and on the other hand, I would love to get the sort of coverage the Premier got in the daily newspaper Thursday for her press conference -- practically a full-page spread. But hey, I'm not the Premier and the Premier is in charge of the Government which runs the country. I am just a lowly Opposition member who sometimes does feel like he has to go into a frenzy to capture the news media's attention. A rational low-key logical argument sometimes just isn't sexy enough to catch their eye So we learn -- often the hard way -- how to appeal to the news media. Sadly, I think that's the direction in which we are headed -- thanks largely to the influence of TV and radio. People like their news on the run, in short, quick takes. It's more entertaining and an attention grabber if you can reduce the story to a 60 second sound bite or two snappy paragraphs with a provocative headline. "Cat fight at friendly forum'' sure got readers' attention Tuesday morning. Who knows, they might even have read the story -- all the way through? Certainly Mr. Philip got good coverage -- unedited -- and this for the man who pilloried the newspaper as hostile and loathsome.

Will I get the same? Even if I don't, even if I am not fully reported, or in my view I am not reported fairly, I will live with it. Begrudgingly, sure.

Maybe even angry depending on how it turns out. But what's the alternative? A muzzled press? A controlled press? That has to be worse -- not necessarily for John Barritt the politician, but for John Barritt the citizen, and all the other citizens who are part of the democratic society we call Bermuda.

We need a strong press and reporters who are not afraid to ask questions, to challenge the authorities, and report fairly and accurately. They fulfil an important role on behalf of the electorate.

If you believe in democracy, you must be wedded to the concept of a Free Press, which means free to report, for better or for worse.