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Hon. Cordel Hyde, PUP Lake I
"I am glad I came. They put us to shame. They have well researched, well prepared, better behaved, rather articulate and really in touch with the issues. I think it's a wake us call for us as parliamentarians that we really need to listen to these kids, because we are legislating for them, we are providing for them, but we don't ever speak to them and so they have this kind of thing maybe once every quarter or twice a year because it is important that parliamentarians are the ones who are providing the resources, understand and appreciate what the children need and what the children want and see. So I am glad I came."

Reporter
"How are you and the members of the Opposition contribute to what happened today? I believe you have up your time as well for their preparation."

Hon. Cordel Hyde, PUP Lake I
"Yeah, I promise some weeks ago that I would have avail myself yesterday to assist some of the kids in terms of the preparation and so I came, met the young lady who was representing for Lake Independence and also got an opportunity to talk with about 15-20 of them about what's important to them, what's exciting to them, what they want to see."

UDP Senator Carla Barnett addressed the issue of absence among UDP political representatives and accepted all the blows the kids gave.

Hon. Carla Barnett, UDP Senator
"I don't think so at all. In fact my ministry as you know was a collaborating partner in this effort. We spent a lot of time working with the young people on the ground to get them prepared and they themselves did a lot of work. Some people were away. I wish more who were here would have been able to come, but they must be otherwise occupied, so yes I agree with you we could have had more, but that is not to say that its not an interest because we all work very closely together with the children with the process."

Reporter
"However, what we heard here today was very sobering and vey stridently anti-government, criticizing with statistics, with research. One has to hear this and be sober and realize wow we are failing the children of Belize."

Hon. Carla Barnett, UDP Senator
"I think we all understand what the problems are. For me it's good to know that the young people are thinking these things through for themselves and having that conversation. In fact today they were leading the conversation and we need that. We need to listen to our young people, we need to understand what we need to address properly in order to be able to get where we want to go."

Reporter
"So will anyone in the government, in the cabinet next week, be saying boy, you what those children were saying? You hear how they bash us for this and that? We need to do something, because there are voters. These kids will be voters in a few years."

Hon. Carla Barnett, UDP Senator
"Yes they will and I tell you we live stream this from the press office and several of the TV stations. For me that very good because we are giving the children the air. We've not traditionally done that and so giving the air, the voice, understanding that they have an opinion that is valuable I think is a big step."