At the opening session of the PLP's Annual Delegate's Conference, Premier & Party Leader Dr. Ewart Brown delivered a barn burner. He spoke not only of the accomplishments of the PLP government - but, he artfully articulated who we, as a Progressive Labour Party are, and why we fight. Our Party Leader in full:

Good Evening, Ladies and Gentlemen

Some of my favorite verses that typify my theme for you this
evening are found in the Bible’s Book of Ecclesiastes, Chapter 3.

1 To everything there is a season,
and a time to every purpose under the heavens:

2 A time to be born and a time to die;
a time to plant and a time to pluck up that which is planted;

3 A time to kill and a time to heal;
a time to break down and a time to build up;

4 A time to weep and a time to laugh;
a time to mourn and a time to dance…

7 …A time to rend and a time to sew;
a time to keep silence and a time to speak;

8 A time to love and a time to hate;
a time of war and a time for peace.

So, what I want to speak with you about this evening – indeed, the question I pose for us is “What time is it for the Bermuda Progressive Labour Party? What season is this for the PLP?

Well, let us first humbly and thankfully acknowledge that we are about to celebrate 10 years of a PLP Government in this country. It has been an event-filled decade with ups and downs and countless successes. I draw on the words of the late, great L. Frederick Wade who told the Mid-Ocean News in 1990 “ I have seen some successes. I have no frustrations. Sometimes we get so busy in our battles we forget how many hills we have taken. We have taken a lot of hills.”

This PLP government has done so much in so little time. When we committed to changing Bermuda in 1998 we spoke in terms of making this Island a better place for all Bermudians. We set out a vision for this country which meant wholesale change in the way we had lived and worked for centuries. With God’s help and the trust of the people we set about making a new Bermuda, recognizing that change is a process and not an event. And, we have done well, Brothers and Sisters. We have done well. Tomorrow evening, in the Leader’s Report, I will specifically address the many accomplishments of the PLP Government. Tonight, I want to continue to focus on what time it is for the PLP and I want to articulate what our current mission is and what it is not.

So, first let us tackle a few elephants in the middle of this floor – let us start with the question of my continued leadership and whether there will be a challenge at this Annual Conference. From what I hear from so many of you and from PLP Constitution experts, our Constitution provides that I was elected to serve a 4-year term as Party Leader. That term began in 2006 and will run through 2010, unless the Party determines otherwise. My position on this is that I humbly serve at the will of the Party, and until I hear differently from you, I will continue to serve as your Party Leader until October of 2010.

To my friends here and all over Bermuda who have called and written me over the last few weeks to offer support and encouragement in the onslaught of the media attention on whether there would be a challenge, I say thank you. Your prayers, your words, your kind gestures mean the world to me. I will continue to work tirelessly on behalf of the Progressive Labour Party and the people of Bermuda.

To my detractors, I say I will continue to work tirelessly on behalf of the Progressive Labour Party and the people of Bermuda.

To the media who have glorified in whatever dissension they can find and create in the Party with regard to my leadership, I say to you: Write what you will. This grand and venerable Progressive Labour Party will never, ever allow you to dictate our agenda or set our course. I will continue to work tirelessly on behalf of the Progressive Labour Party and the people of Bermuda…

…Because that’s what time it is. In our Party – indeed in our nation – it is time for us to continue to move Bermuda forward. What does that mean for us within the PLP? It means that the organization and cohesiveness of the PLP must take precedence over any individual.

In 2006, we had a leadership change. I was bestowed the honour of becoming your Party Leader. With all due respect to the former Party Leader, who stepped up to serve our Party and our country when we needed unity, healing and direction -- That election is over. It is finished. Let us move forward to work together on behalf of the Party and the people of Bermuda.

With all due respect to former Cabinet Ministers, Bermuda is better off today because of your great service. We are eternally grateful. But, serving as a Cabinet Minister – or serving as a Premier or any other government worker – is a privilege, not a right. It is time to move from what might have been to what is. It is time to move forward to work together on behalf of the Party and the people of Bermuda.

It is time for all of us to put Party before person – to be loyal to the PLP. Why is loyalty so important? It is the one thing that trumps infighting and external forces that seek to divide us. Loyalty suppresses internal personal agendas that have more to do with likes and dislikes than where we take the country. Loyalty provides the enlightened thought that promotes Party success over personal gain. Loyalty means supporting something bigger than yourself. Support the Party.

It’s time for us to go back to the days when we viewed the PLP as our family. This does not mean that I want to see the PLP with only one voice, or that I do not value seeing our various members’ comments in print and electronic media. The thing that makes us so vibrant is that we have many voices and many opinions, and we should continue to express them. We should continue to disagree, and fight vigorously for our beliefs with regard to the direction of this Party and this nation. But, as a family and a unified Party, we should never allow ourselves to be used against each other like the crabs in a barrel that our enemies want to see.

And, let me be clear, this is not about something anyone said about Ewart Brown. As individuals, we are all personally irrelevant when it comes to the continued viability of the Progressive Labour Party or our beloved country. Again, in the words of our dear Freddie Wade, “Those who see the Party as an opportunity for personal satisfaction, personal financial gain, or personal political gain must reassess their values and reshape their ideas so that they develop the conviction required not for my sake but for the good of the Party, the country and the people whom we represent.” This is about putting the Party first. That’s what time it is.

It is time for us to proudly lift up our Labour roots and strengthen the ties that bind us. To paraphrase Senator Barack Obama, who many feel will be the next President of the United States, I could no more disown Labour than I could disown my very own grandmother who toiled in the homes of the Tuckers Town rich, nor my uncle who was one of the renowned workers in the Labour movement here in Bermuda. This Party is the party of Labour – our histories and our destinies are one and the same – we are Labour.

However, happily, times have changed. Although protest and dissent are the hallmarks of a democratic society, you do not have to use the same manner of protest with a PLP government that you used 30 years ago with a UBP government. Why? Because back then, you did not have the Premier’s home phone number. You did not have his cell number or his e-mail address. You could not drive by the Minister’s home, or see her in church on Sunday morning. It used to be that the only absolute way to get a Minister or Premier’s personal attention was to cause inconvenience to your cousin or your sister or that valuable tourist by disrupting bus, taxi or school service. You could not sit at the same table with Government. You had no ear and you had no voice, so you had to lay down tools.

Let me say to Labour for all to hear: You have a voice that this PLP government respects and welcomes. You have a listening ear that is always available to you. Before you down tools, let us talk. Teachers, before you decide not to come to school and leave parents and school children to fend for themselves on a given morning, please let us talk. Government civil servants, before you leave your work stations, know that with a PLP government, you are more than your job or your profession, you are a neighbor, you are a relative, you are a friend – let us talk. We can stay at our work stations and move this country forward because you have access to your PLP government.

We invite our Labour leaders and sisters and brothers to use the family circle of the PLP and join us at Central Committee meetings, where you can advance your position before the Premier, Cabinet Members, and Parliamentarians and Senators, as well as your neighbors and your friends.

As a country, we can build upon the strategies of the great Labour leaders, Ottiwell Simmons and Gene Blakeney and imagine a time in Bermuda when before any labour strike happens, we have had meetings all the way up the line to the affected Minister’s office and to the Premier’s office. We can imagine a time when we know that every effort to reach agreement has been exhausted and that strike is a last resort – not a first recourse. We can imagine a time when Bermuda joins other unions and organizations around the world and practices representative democracy, such that we no longer have to grind to a halt in the middle of the work day and affect every element of our economy because we want to have a general membership meeting. I believe that that time is overdue.

And as we speak to these changing times, I want to address the situation in the New York Tourism office, where some of our people were laid off. This was a difficult decision to make because of its fundamental impact on the lives of dedicated Tourism staff and their families. In order for Bermuda to stay competitive, we had to implement a new sales strategy in the U.S. – one that uses the aggressive and focused wholesale, networking, tele-marketing and computer-based strategies that work today. That does not mean that we do not value or are not grateful for the work that our staff in the U.S. has done for Bermuda all of these years. That does not mean, in the words of some, that we are hiring a white firm to replace Black Bermudians, or that we are asking Bermudians to train non-Bermudians about our country.

It simply means that as much as we hated to do so, this PLP government had to do what was best for all of Bermuda. We could not, and we can not, guarantee any government employee a lifetime job in New York City. We cannot guarantee the job you want here in Bermuda, where we have displaced workers from the Wyndham Hotel or St. George’s Golf Course. What we can do and what we have done is gladly and humanely assist our New York employees with finding other jobs using the new model where we can, and if not, in guaranteeing them jobs and relocation back home in Bermuda. We have done that. There are times when we must simply put Bermuda first, and that is what this PLP government did.

Finally, what time is it for the PLP? It is time for us to lay down both our swords and our daggers. As many of you know, I can personally fight among the best, but it is time to spend more time healing and congealing than bickering and plotting. It is time to stop allowing negative, external forces to come between us to exploit our healthy differences for unhealthy purposes.

I invite all of us to come back to the Party meetings and feel free to air our differences. I invite you to come to visit me as your Party Leader and talk about ways you think the Party – indeed the country – must head toward the future. All of Bermuda should know that for the past two years, I have reserved Thursdays of each week for anyone to schedule time to meet with me about anything. Join our Brown Bag lunches on the lawn of Cabinet.

If we agree, let us go forward together. If we disagree, rest assured that in the humblest way I know how, I am simply doing my best on behalf of this great Party and Bermuda.

We are at a time in the Party’s history when we are being called upon to execute the dreams and aspirations of our ancestors whose voices are ringing in our ears to stay to the wicket – to not shy away from tough decisions or run at the first hint of unpopularity. We must make decisions for the ages as now is our time. It is right now that we have the opportunity to make positive changes that so many fought for for so long.

I am humbled, but proud, that you elected me as your Party Leader and as the Leader of this country. I believe that I have the vision, zeal, and tenacity to pursue the dreams of our ancestors.

But, I never promised you a rose garden.

What I promised was that I would lead a government dedicated to the empowerment of the many and not the few. I promised that we would implement the changes necessary to make Bermuda a place it has never been before for so many of our people – where our children will be able to rise as high as their vision and their wings will take them. I promised you that I would not be afraid of the poisoned pens and whispers that would befall us as we forge ahead asking for the things that rightfully belong to all of the people – a candid reflection on our history, and a shared stake in our future.

And, I am ecstatic to report that this PLP government is delivering on that promise. We have not lost our course. We are charting new ones. This PLP government is empowering a new generation of people who had never before been given the opportunity to participate in the wealth of this economy. I will let them speak for themselves.

(Entrepreneurs spoke.)

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I promised you that I would put together a Cabinet of PLP pacesetters. And, I have fulfilled that promise. I would like for our Cabinet Ministers to stand. These Ministers fight hard everyday to fulfill the mandate of positive change for the people of Bermuda. They deserve our adulation and our gratitude.

Our backbenchers are our unsung heroes. They join us in Parliament and fight valiantly for programs that benefit us all. They stand up for us, and deserve much respect and many thanks. Please stand.

Our senators take the ball and run with it. Our upper chamber has some of our finest – we would not be where we are without them, and we salute them and thank them as well. Please stand.

Most importantly of all, as I conclude, I extend my heartfelt thanks to the officers, members and staff of the Progressive Labour Party. It is your constant reminders that I am your Premier… that you know how hard this PLP Government works on your behalf… that you have my back… to keep on doing what I am doing on behalf of Bermuda… It is your words, your notes, your phone calls, your special whispers in my ear, and your prayers that keep me going. It is your legacy and your greatness that keep me strong as a leader. It is our greatness as a Party in power at the right time in Bermuda’s history that will continue to move us forward as a people and as a nation.

Let us stand.
PLP all the way. All the way PLP.
Good night and God bless.

We invite all Bermudians to join our PLP family and work with us to build a better Bermuda.