The Progressive Labour Party and the One Bermuda Alliance attacked each other’s records on Friday during a debate on Good Governance legislation.While Government MPs said the act was another example of the Government working to address the concerns of the community, Opposition MPs questioned why the legislation was coming now, rather than when the PLP took power.The Good Governance Act makes a criminal offence of collusion, where someone has sought to “improperly exert influence in order to obtain a contract”. Penalties include a maximum fine of $10,000 and/or 12 months in prison.The legislation also creates an offence for those who penalise whistle-blowers, and allows Cabinet Ministers to hear appeals and applications on behalf of other Ministers who have a conflict of interest.Speaking during the debate, Former Premier Alex Scott likened opposition members to carping girlfriends, who are never satisfied. “If we say the sun is rising, you say it’s setting. This piece of legislation has been a long time coming.”He said there were “ills and allegations” under the UBP and mentioned Wreck Hill and the airport.“We know what was absent at that time, as I sat over there,” said the PLP backbencher, pointing to the opposition benches. “Not once did they bring good governance legislation to address those ills.”Mr Scott said opposition members were “eloquent but not necessarily right”.“The Progressive Labour Party, as an opposition, and the Progressive Labour Party, as a government, has had an acute awareness of fairness and standing up for Bermudians.”He said the public should remember that the PLP passed public access to information legislation and created the Office of the Ombudsman and that no prior government had ever brought good governance legislation to the House.Shadow Finance Minister Bob Richards responded that if the Government truly believed the previous administration were corrupt, they should change the legislation to make it retroactive.“Let’s forget about the three-year time limit, let’s go back 20, 30 years. I don’t care,” Mr Richards said.“If they did something wrong, if they did something unethical, find them and prosecute them. Do it posthumously if necessary.“You cannot make vague allusions about something in the past and not do anything about it. If you have proof of something someone did 20 years ago, let’s go after them.”Mr Richards also cited unethical behaviour discovered in investigations into Global Hue and TCD contracts, saying that at the end of the day no one was prosecuted.“If when the rubber meets the road nothing happens, what is the point?“If this Government does not have the testicular fortitude to enforce sanctions on those who break the rules, than this legislation is not worth the paper it’s written on.”Government Estates Minister Michael Scott said that the legislation being debated lays a groundwork for Governments of the future, and Bermuda has faced issues of conflicts of interest and corruption for a long time.He acknowledged that issues have arisen during the PLP’s tenure, but that Government has responded by creating the Ombudsman post, empowering the Auditor General and creating good governance legislation.“It’s very meaningful,” Mr Scott said. “It’s a process of evolution, and it’s very important for just to have it.“There have been issues. People taking jackknife dives into the public purse, even in my Ministry. We are not legislating in a vacuum. We have a reason to be promulgating this kind of legislation.”Mr Scott said the legislation was designed to create a culture of consequences by protecting whistle-blowers.Transport Minister Walter Roban also defended the PLP’s record as Government, saying the legislation was an example of Premier Cox fulfilling a promise to the public.“This Government has had a long commitment to seeing this happen,” Mr Roban said. “That doesn’t mean we haven’t found ourselves challenged, but the record shows that we have stood steadfastly committed to good governance. This Government does not run away from what is needed.”Health Minister Zane DeSilva meanwhile argued that the UBP should have established good governance during their reign in Government.“The Honourable Member Kim Swan talked about foxes in the henhouse,” Mr DeSilva said. “In 1998 when we came into the hen house, there were hardly any hens left. The foxes that were in the hen house before us pretty much cleared it out.”When Mr Swan responded that when the UBP lost power there was a $53 million surplus, Mr DeSilva sparked laughter from the opposition by responding: “There’s certainly not $52 million there any more.”He continued to say that the money had been spent fixing the “deplorable” state of the Island’s infrastructure.Mr DeSilva also suggested that there were conflicts of public interest in Government before 1998, asking who owned the Island’s office spaces and provided legal services.“When they do business, they are astute businessmen. When we do it we are crooks,” Mr DeSilva said.He also praised the Island’s civil servants, saying it was wrong to put them all in the same pot because of the actions of a few.The OBA’s Mark Pettingill meanwhile said he thought it was surprising to hear a Member of the House speak on good governance six months after having to resign from his post after being embroiled in a scandal.Without calling the Minister by name, Mr Pettingill said: “The appearance was you were in the wrong place dealing with the wrong applicant and you should resign. The whole spirit of the act reflects exactly what has gone on.”He further noted that the concept of good governance is nothing new, and that it dates back thousands of years.“The law in regards to this has been around for centuries,” he said. “The PLP Government isn’t making something new with this act. They are already embodied statutorily in some places.”Commenting on the statements of Mr Scott that the legislation would create a culture of accountability, Mr Pettingill said: “What culture have we been operating in for the last 14 years that now requires a culture of accountability? Why now after 14 years in power?“Now, today, in 2012 having been elected in 1998 we have the audacity to stand before the people of this House, the people of this Country and say we are going to have a culture of accountability? Come on.”Planning Minister Marc Bean said that he didn’t expect he would have to stand and debate good governance, saying he would have thought the opposition would applaud the Government for the legislation.Noting the creation of the Ombudsman post and the boosted powers of the Auditor General, Mr Bean said the PLP, and the Premier specifically, had made great strides in the area of good governance.“Our Minister of Finance has done more in this area than any other leader or Premier in the history of this Country,” Mr Bean said. “She hasn’t just said it, she has done it.”He also said that constitutionally, Ministers do not have direct control over the actions of members of the civil service, but when issues arise he said the Opposition always blame the Cabinet.OBA MP Grant Gibbons rose next to assert: “If the other side had a sense that we are opposed to this legislation, we are not.”Nevertheless, Dr Gibbons questioned some of the Bill’s wording. Saying that disclosure of interests should be a part of the Ministerial Code of Conduct, the Paget East MP called upon the Premier to table it.Dr Gibbons was reprimanded by the Speaker for “regurgitating what has already come to this House”, after he said: “This is a Government that came in 1998 with the expression ‘sunshine of public scrutiny’ — but very quickly we got ‘we had to deceive you’.”He also raised hackles when he said he’d been told that the roadshow seeking financing for the public private partnership behind the new King Edward VII Memorial had difficulty in securing bidders, “because Bermuda’s reputation was so bad”.Rising on a point of order, Mr Roban challenged Dr Gibbons to name his sources. The OBA MP said he would communicate them privately to Mr Roban after speaking.Rising for her reply, Premier Paula Cox had strong words for the OBA’s Trevor Moniz for remarks earlier in the debate: it was, she said, “a scurrilous attempt to malign two senior civil servants by name”, and “totally inappropriate, despicable and reprehensible”.As for the public private partnership for Bermuda’s hospital, Ms Cox praised the Bermuda Hospitals Board, saying the arrangement had been a model for other jurisdictions.As for the line “We had to deceive you”, Ms Cox said: “That was made by a former Premier in a very political environment. While I am in no way, shape or form defending it, let’s separate the political personality of the government now and then.”As the debate turned to clauses of the Act, Mr Moniz questioned its distinction between indictable and summary offences.Ms Cox said there was no time limit on the prosecution of indictable offences, but the Act extended the time period to pursue summary offences under the Auditors Act, from six to 12 months, to up to three years.Dr Gibbons next questioned the Act’s wording regarding conflict of interest on the part of Ministers.He asked why it was worded “if the Minister is aware of an interest” instead of “if the Minister has an interest”. Dr Gibbons also questioned if the clause dealing with collusion relating to Government contracts would apply to organisations like the Bermuda Land Development Corporation (BLDC) or to quangos.Ms Cox answered that it included all public bodies like the BLDC.As for the wording relating to interests, she said disclosure was on a voluntary basis, and that Ministers could potentially have interests, such as links to secret trusts, that they were completely unaware of.But Mr Pettingill called for tougher wording, telling the House: “It happens all the time in drugs cases. Everybody says, ‘I didn’t know that was in my bag’.”Ms Cox suggested the OBA MP was just displaying his legal clout, noting: “There is a consequence — but it is not a criminal act.”Mr Moniz weighed in next, saying that what was being proposed was “purely an honour system”. He also questioned what would be done about “tainted decisions” such as the granting of a licence or a contract.Ms Cox responded that under the law, there was the opportunity to go to the courts and call for a judicial review. Mr Moniz persisted, saying: “With some decisions, there is no obvious person to go to court and spend the money to get the decision set aside.”Ms Cox repeated: “We are not talking about an offence.” She said the best recourse, if there were an issue, would be to look at the primary legislation.The Good Governance Act of 2012 was unanimously passed by the House.