Member of Parliament for St Mary Central, Dr Morais Guy, is taking the state-owned National Water Commission (NWC) to task over its regular practice of digging up roadways and leaving them in a deplorable state.

Guy called out the NWC on Wednesday during his contribution to the State of the Constituency Debate in the House of Representatives.

“All my (parliamentary) colleagues bar none, speaking in these debates, have spoken about the almost wanton destruction of the roadways by the NWC without reinstatement. My constituency falls within that lot too and when the roadways are dug up there is no urgency or seemingly no plans to reinstate them,” Guy stated.

He highlighted that “some roads have these outstanding digs for 2-3 years”.

He told the House that he wrote to both the NWC and the National Works Agency (NWA) almost a year ago about the practice but has received nothing more than an acknowledgment of the letter.

“I want to know what is the status of the MOU with the NWC/NWA with regards to rehabilitation of cuts in the roads. It is high time that that MOU is brought into being, acted upon or rescinded,” said Guy.

He also said now was an opportune time for the Minister of Economic Growth and Job Creation, Prime Minister Andrew Holness, under whose Ministry both agencies fall, to resolve the issue.

“It cannot be fair that out of the small patching allocation given to my constituency and I can only speak to mine, that some of this is being spent to correct the defects in the roads as a result of the NWC digging. This only reduces the potential extent of the patching programme and creates continued challenges for the motoring public. It is subsidising one agency from another and cannot be allowed to continue,” Guy said.

During her contribution to constituency debate, the Member of Parliament for Manchester Central, Rhoda Crawford, chastised the NWC after she said she was informed by a constituent that the water utility had dug a roadway merely two hours after it had been patched.