Leader of Government Business in the House of Representatives Edmund Bartlett and his Opposition counterpart Phillip Paulwell have denied that the parliamentary year was ended last Tuesday.

The claim was made by Opposition senators Lambert Brown and Donna Scott Mottley.

The issue came to the fore in the Senate on Friday when Government Senator Abka Fitz-Henley chided Scott Mottley for accusing the government of seeking to end the parliamentary year prematurely in order to not facilitate tabling of the Integrity Commission’s annual report. The report was tabled in the Senate on Friday.

Earlier in the week, Scott Mottley addressed a People’s National Party (PNP) meeting and lashed out at the Government.

“Suddenly now everything rush up and Parliament is ending on the 24th of June,” she told party supporters at a rally in Papine, St Andrew, on Wednesday.

“What are they hiding from? Why are they locking down the Parliament before the 30th of June when they had planned for the 2nd of July,” she questioned.

Fitz-Henley accused Scott-Mottley of being untruthful.

“The Senate knows that when the parliamentary year is coming to a close or parliament is going on recess, notification is given by the leaders of Government business in both houses or the Speaker or the president. No such thing happened. The suggestion that the Government had indicated it would go on recess last week is a continuation of a trend where the Opposition has no regard for the truth. It is a barefaced lie,” Fitz-Henley told the Senate.

Opposition Senator Brown defended Scott Mottley.

“The member is misleading the Senate because the leader of government business in the House conveyed to Phillip Paulwell that the parliamentary year would have come to an end last week. It is on that basis that Senator Scott Mottley has spoken. The parliamentary secretary knows not what he speaks,” Senator Brown commented.

Opposition spokesman Phillip Paulwell making his contribution to the 2025/26 Sectoral Debate on Tuesday

But in separate statements to the media, Bartlett and Paulwell appeared to support Fitz-Henley’s version of events that no communication was given to the Opposition that the parliamentary year would end last week.

“I just want to be very clear that there is absolutely no agreement with regard to proroguing or taking the summer break on the 24th. Indeed, the bill that I as House Leader and minister of tourism carried last Tuesday to the House, the Opposition House leader and myself spoke and we agreed to take it next week,” Bartlett said in a statement to the media. “So it was very clear that the Parliament would reconvene beyond the 24th and I’d be surprised if the leader of Opposition business would say we had indicated we would stop sitting and not go beyond the 24th. There was no such agreement. I understand that everyone is trying to make political mileage out of everything but my god truth and honesty must find a place somewhere.”

Paulwell was quoted by Nationwide radio on Friday as denying Senator Brown’s claim that Bartlett had told him that Parliament would be curtailed on June 24, 2025.

“There must be a misunderstanding. What was said is that the sectoral debate was ending one week earlier than planned, on June 24 instead of July 2. But Mr Bartlett did not say that we would be on recess. There was the assumption that we would not be meeting but that was not said to me by Mr Bartlett,” Paulwell was quoted as saying.