DOZENS of constituents of former Health Minister Dr Fenton Ferguson descended on the precincts of Gordon House Tuesday noisily expressing support for their embattled member of Parliament (MP), who was shifted to the Ministry of Labour and Social Security earlier in the day.

But, there was no need for the presence of the constituents, dressed in Dr Ferguson’s election T-shirts, because Leader of the House of Representatives Phillip Paulwell, threw out the Opposition’s bid to censure him for his failures as health minister.

Opposition MP Daryl Vaz had tabled a motion in the House of Representatives last week seeking to have Ferguson censured for “dereliction of duty”. However, Paulwell rejected the motion in a letter to House Speaker Michael Peart.

Vaz walked out after the speaker announced the rejection. At the end of the sitting, only the Opposition Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) spokesman on local government, Desmond McKenzie, stayed behind to participate in the debate on the three Local Government Reform Bills. JLP sources were unable to say Tuesday night if any other action is being contemplated against Ferguson.

Vaz had cited issues surrounding the recent deaths of 19 premature babies at public hospitals; the negative results of an audit of the health institutions which was requested by Ferguson, but which he initially refused to make public; as well as his handling of the previous Chikungunya epidemic, as evidence of Ferguson’s lack of competence.

However, Paulwell noted that Ferguson was no longer the minister of health and secondly, that motions critical of the conduct of ministers, individually or collectively, do not fall within the Westminster convention requiring that priority be given to those which test the House’s confidence in the Government.

“There is, therefore, no established basis for my giving priority to this motion, which relates to an individual minister at this time,” Paulwell’s letter advising the Speaker said.

Dr Ferguson took over as minister of labour and social security Tuesday, after being removed from the Ministry of Health by Prime Minister Portia Simpson Miller, following outcries against his handling of the ministry.

He has since been replaced as minister of health by former minister without portfolio in the Ministry of Finance and Planning, Horace Dalley.

— Balford Henry