“A Home Is Not a Billboard”: Brown Burke says Government’s plaquing of beneficiaries’ homes Is dehumanising

Opposition Spokesperson on Social Protection and Social Transformation, Dr Angela Brown Burke, MP, today condemned the Government’s practice of affixing permanent plaques bearing the Prime Minister’s name to houses built under the New HOPE Social Housing Programme. Dr Brown Burke described the move as a dehumanising act that trades the dignity of poor Jamaicans for political promotion.

“Every Jamaican deserves a safe roof over their head. But no Jamaican should have to pay for that roof with their privacy and dignity,” Dr. Brown Burke said. “A home is a place of refuge, pride, and peace. It is not, and should never be, a billboard. Yet that is exactly what this Government has turned these homes into: a permanent advertisement announcing that the people inside were once in need.”

The Opposition Spokesperson stressed that social housing is funded by the taxes of the Jamaican people and delivered by the State, not by any single politician. “When you put one person’s name on a house paid for by all of us, you send a dangerous message. You tell struggling families that they should be personally grateful to an individual, instead of being assured of their right as citizens,” she said. “Worse, you mark them. You expose vulnerable mothers, children, and elders to stigma and public scrutiny for the rest of their lives. That is not social protection. That is branding.”

Dr Brown Burke warned that such practices blur the line between public service and political campaigning, and have no place in a country that claims to value every citizen. “Jamaica deserves better. Our people deserve better. Dignity is not negotiable,” she declared.

The Opposition is calling on the Government to immediately:

1. Remove existing personalised plaques from beneficiaries’ homes
2. Discontinue the practice permanently
3. Adopt a policy that recognises national projects in a way that upholds, not undermines, the dignity of the people they serve

“Social protection must empower, not embarrass. It must lift people up, not label them,” Dr Brown Burke concluded.