Prime Minister and Minister of Public Works and Communication, Samuel Hinds, on Monday clarified that he never made a commitment to the National Assembly that “blackouts” will end after November 5.

He offered the response at the last sitting of the National Assembly, following oral queries raised by Opposition Leader Robert Corbin on the matter.

Corbin told the House that the Prime Minister had informed the House that “blackouts” will end on November 5, but this has not happened.

Hinds acknowledged that he did address the House on the issue of “blackouts” but unlike what Corbin believes, he never said that there will be no power outages.

“I did say that when the new power station (at Kingston) came into operation on November 5, there will be an additional 20 megawatts available, and that should greatly reduce the likelihood and incidents of power outages,” he reported.

The Prime Minister also said that the three Wartsila generators are all brand new and all have been in operation since December 17.

He noted too that the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the Company, Bharrat Dindyal, had said at the commissioning that during the running in period, one of the units was down awaiting some change of equipment.

Apparently, the Prime Minister said the manufacturer adjusted some lubricating flow improperly and a bearing was burnt, but this was fixed and that unit was again back into operation.

He did not provide to the House the cost to fix the burnt bearing but was confident the manufacturer will meet the expenditure as it was their fault that caused the glitch.