Prime Minister Perry Christie has taken St. Anne’s MP Hubert Chipman to task over his claim that the boundaries report he signed off on differed from the one tabled in the House of Assembly last week.

Mr. Chipman is currently a part of a government delegation, which travelled to Guyana for CARICOM, meetings alongside Foreign Affairs Minister Fred Mitchell.

Mr. Christie said he was distressed by the comments and revealed that he has told Mr. Mitchell to tell Mr. Chipman that his action was “a terrible thing (to do)”.

“The report that he signed came to Parliament as is. I made a communication indicating that whenever a debate is finished, as prime minister under the constitutional powers that I have, I was going to recommend one change that was agreed to when we did the resolution, and that was a name change from Montagu to Freetown,” the prime minister said.

“So it is a distressing sort of intervention that he made because a judge of the Supreme Court who always says, ‘Listen, I’m not here to play the politics, I’m here to guarantee fairness.

“And that judge signed off on it. Everyone who knows the Speaker knows the Speaker is a man who prides himself on being fair so I think what he did was unfortunate.”

On February 13th, Mr. Chipman sent a letter to House Speaker Dr. Kendal Major in which alleged that the report he signed as the official opposition’s representative on the constituencies commission was different from the one Mr. Christie presented to Parliament.

Mr. Christie added he assumed Mr. Chipman did what he did because he was “forced” into signing the document “for the purpose of laying the foundation for legal action.”

Supreme Court Justice Ian Winder granted permission on Thursday to members of the opposition who are challenging the constitutionality of the boundaries report in court to submit Mr Chipman’s letter to the court.