The last government left the country in a very strong financial position, MLA Rolston Anglin told the Legislative Assembly.
And, he told the House on Monday, the present government should be thankful for that strong position they had inherited from a cash and investment perspective.
The West Bay Member was making his contribution to the debate on the Throne Speech and Budget Address.
The government said it is going to give the RCIP more money but what would the government do to make the police service accountable to parliament, he wondered.
How would the results be obtained and what was it the police were going to do with the money, he asked.
There is a deep wound in the community between the citizens and the police, he felt, and the police need the support of the community.
Mr. Anglin, who spoke of brazen criminals and a lack of police presence, said that when authority was not there, people behaved very differently.
If the police thought they would solve crime without being seen by the community, they had another thing coming, he said.
The police must get into the community and earn trust, he added.
The country has an airport that needs upgrading and until Cayman gets a road network built to the standard it needs to be, it would affect the economy and jeopardise the tourism product, he claimed.
If he was a tourist, he said, and looked out and saw the long lines of traffic he would wonder if it was really a place he wanted to be.
Traffic jams are costing the country and he believes the road network is in need of an upgrade.
Cayman is also going to have to upgrade the prison facility because there are hardened criminals but not up-to-standard maximum security.
There are a lot of development needs and he did not believe the country could continue to go down the road of bank debt to fund those projects, he said.
The country is going to have to look at financing and come up with smart ways of financing which achieved what it needed to achieve, he told the House.
To achieve the Caymanian dream required a minimum threshold of earning power, said Mr. Anglin.
The minimum wage was a controversial issue, he said. It needs to be thought about and studied and a risk analysis done so it was clear what impact it would have.
Whether it was the minimum wage or some other method, it had to be made sure that Caymanians were better able to achieve the Caymanian dream, he said.
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