Barbados Red Legs flag – A symbol of cultural affirmation

Barbados Red-Legs can now boast their own cultural flag

“I know as an outsider, no symbology can be foisted onto another culture;

yet my humble offering might spark the imagination of someone who is from there, and inspire some movement toward cultural affirmation.”

contributed by Three-fold Now

The Red Legs are a cultural community in the Caribbean island of Barbados. They are descendants of Irish and Scottish indentured servants—some forcibly enslaved by Cromwell—and remain as “poor whites” in what is otherwise a predominantly Afro-Caribbean nation. The performer Rihanna claims some family ties to this Irish-Barbadian lineage. 

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Canadian Court upholds Revenue Canada – disallows “Barbados Structure”, penalizes Canadian company’s use of offshore Barbados subsidiary.

 Marzen Artistic Aluminum Ltd. v. The Queen (2014 TCC 194)

I’m don’t know much about this kind of thing, but it doesn’t sound good for Barbados. According to our Google Alerts, the tax sector is abuzz with this latest Canadian ruling that runs 80 pages. (download the ruling here – PDF)

Comments from the cheap seats?

In a lengthy set of reasons, the Tax Court upheld all but a fraction of the CRA’s reassessment of the taxpayer, such reassessments having disallowed the deduction of approximately $7.1M of fees paid by the Canadian taxpayer to its Barbados subsidiary. The Court also upheld the imposition of a penalty under subsection 247(3) of the Act…

… from Dentons Tax Litigation blog: Marzen: Artistic Barbados tax plan defeated

Another ‘driver lost control’ Barbados bus accident

Previous accident: Drivers should be careful not to apply de brakes too hard as de wheels are only semi-attached to the bus!

Overloaded, top-heavy, too fast, poorly maintained

It is becoming a weekly news story: “Bus driver loses control, (insert number) Injured.” This week’s accident is reported in Barbados Today as 13 injured in bus accident in St. George. Oh… wait… that was last week’s accident at Taitts Road with Cenetta Bennett driving. The driver in this week’s accident at Rowans Road is ‘R. Headley’: 13 hurt in bus accident.

Perhaps the newspapers should reserve a space on the front page of the Saturday edition each week to feature a photo of the latest bus on its side while emergency personnel lift casualties from the wreck. Even the tourists write with horror about taking the bus. The latest TripAdvisor story on Barbados buses asks What drugs are the Barbados bus drivers on?

It is certainly true that the speed and recklessness of many drivers play major parts in the bus disasters – but there are other factors that the government doesn’t want to see or talk about.