Panton also made no mention of Ashcroft's Waterloo Charitable Trust - which is the owner of 77%. of Speednet.
But earlier this week, Jules Vasquez asked, "can you trust the Trust?" After all, we've been hearing of these Ashcroft affiliated charitable trusts for decades - but not seeing the charity.
When we asked Panton about it, she explained that she too is wary of trusts because of what's happened in the past. Here's how she put it:
Tracy Panton, LOO
"We haven't had great success if any with trust. We didn't have any tangible returns on the sunshine trust. We didn't have any tangible returns on the BTL workers trust. The fact of the matter is that Speednet sold, the Briceno family sold 80% of its company to the Waterloo trust. That was not a function of government, not my government, certainly influenced by the Briceno government because we all knew that Smart was in the red and to save whatever interest they wanted to save in that company, the Briceno aligned company sold to the Waterloo group, 78% almost is owned by the Waterloo group. I say that to make it clear, that is not a function of my administration or the policy of this United Democratic Party. When Smart was selling to the Waterloo Alliance, that was a commercial transaction. Now that we have the situation with BTL that is a public institution, it is not simply a commercial transaction and has to be treated with the level of seriousness that it deserved. and the scrutiny it deserves."
