Local transport operators are being shut out of tourism sector, says Purkiss

KINGSTON, Jamaica—Opposition Spokesperson on Tourism and Linkages, Andrea Purkiss, has charged that local ground transport operators are being shut out of the tourism sector

Purkiss spoke to the issue on June 9 during her contribution to the Sectoral Debate in the House of Representatives.

She highlighted that the Jamaica Union of Travellers Association (JUTA) was created by former Minister of Tourism Francis Tulloch with one explicit mission: “Jamaican hands drive Jamaica’s visitors and with one explicit mission that it should be one avenue of Jamaican ownership”.

Purkiss said that JUTA, along with the Jamaica Co-operative Automobile & Limousine Tours Limited (JCAL) and MAXI Tours represent generations of Jamaican families who built their livelihoods on tourism transportation.

“These local, grassroots ambassadors are being systematically displaced. This Government has allowed major hotel properties to establish their own in-house transportation companies [thus] systematically cutting out JUTA and JCAL operators,” Purkiss said.

She told the Parliament that many all-inclusive properties and foreign companies control transportation while local drivers still pay park fees to access compounds.

“The all-inclusive model is a vertical integration machine: the room, the food, the entertainment, water sports, and now the vehicle all under one foreign corporate umbrella,” she said.

Asserting that “it’s colonisation all over again”, Purkiss said the structure ensures the bulk of tourism revenue never touches Jamaican soil.

-Lynford Simpson