Now that the government has gotten the approval  with a Resolution in the House of Assembly  it needed to temporarily relocate the East Hill Street General Post Office to the Town Centre Mall, it can turn its attention focus to the infrastructural audit of government buildings/offices.

Press Secretary, Anthony Newbold told reporters Tuesday that the audit will answer the important questions.

“How many buildings do we have, what condition are they in, which Ministries  or departments are housed in them, where are they?

“Primarily what condition are they in, but you’re also looking at where are the government services located,” he said.

“Where are we paying all of this rent that we’re talking about, what do we have to deal with? Again you’re talking about fiscal responsibility, you’re talking saving money wherever you can,” he added.

“So let’s look at these buildings and again begin the process of implementing a proper maintenance schedule for government buildings, because there isn’t one.

“You can’t keep constructing buildings every five or ten years, you’d spend all your money constructing buildings.

“So that would be the aim of that infrastructural audit,” he said.

The government has long been trying to reduce the inordinate amount of money spent on  renting buildings for public offices and  reasons   to have buildings of their own.

However, Mr. Newbold said this must come with a maintenance schedule.

“We don’t take care of anything;  we build a new building; five years later we need to build another one because we didn’t take care of the one that we built,” he said.

“So audit of all the government buildings, some new buildings will be built at some point,” he added.

“The  Prime Minister has foreshadowed, he’s talked about the old St. Johns  site top of the hill there on Market Street, as well as the old City Market building there at the brink of the hill, the fact that government buildings will be constructed at those sites.

“So we don’t know what’s going to go there,  but we know there are going to be some government buildings there,” said Mr. Newbold.

Once the audit is complete, the press secretary said the government will make decisions on the way forward in finding proper locations for its staff.