Delroy Chuck WHO IS really concerned about what's best for Jamaica? In any arrangement, it is absolutely necessary to query whether it is in Jamaica's ultimate interest. The Memorandum of Understanding between the trade unions and the government, on the face of it, seems a wonderful thing and everybody is falling over to praise and extol its virtue. Yet, can this agreement be in the best interests of Jamaica, at this time? With the government running a fiscal deficit of at least 7 per cent or 8 per cent, it has to cut expenditure. Having agreed to keep all the workers, it means many government workers will have jobs but little or no capital expenditure or resources to do any work.
CAPITAL EXPENDITURE
It cannot be in Jamaica's best interest for taxpayers to pay workers but they have no work to do. With no money for capital expenditure, the net effect is that the people are unable to get roads fixed, garbage and gullies cleared, proper medical treatment in the hospitals, adequate education material to conduct classes and so on. This year alone, the government has had to cut six billion dollars from its capital budget and, next year, it is unlikely there will be any meaningful capital budget.
Nobody wants workers to lose their jobs but sometimes it is simply necessary. When big money making corporations like BNS, NCB, C&W, etc., laid off workers over the past two years or so, in spite of their massive profits, how come government increased its work force while running a fiscal deficit? The economics doesn't make sense? Can it? The reality is that government's wage bill has gone up inordinately and needs to be reduced. Am I to believe that two years ago the government could not envisage that the whopping 103 per cent increase it gave to some civil servants and parliamentarians would not have caused a fiscal crisis? In the light of the Orane's Report Report of the Task Force To Reduce Waste in the Public Sector, January 1999 which supported the need for a smaller, more streamlined and effective public sector, and noted that since 1991 public sector employment has increased, not decreased, the issue must be when are we going to reduce and streamline the public sector?
POLITICAL ECONOMY
The history of PNP adminis-trations, however, is one of big government and, thus, in the 90s, employment in public adminis-tration simply skyrocketed, which is a major part of the problem affecting the overall political economy of the country. The simple truth is that government is living beyond its means and that cannot be good for Jamaica. Something has to give and since we cannot tax our people anymore or, hopefully, should not borrow to further burden future generations, then the only alternative is to cut government expenditure. But, government has tied its hands with this MOU and no doubt will continue on the same, sorry, path of economic decline that we have experienced for the past ten years and more.
When are we going to properly manage the country's affairs to restore its economic health? Consider the transport sector! Government has injected billions into the sector and, still, it continues to lose millions daily. To what end? Perhaps I am unlucky but if I pass 10 JUTC buses any day, at least eight of them have fewer than a dozen passengers. Can a bus service survive when they are running empty most times? When is a decision going to be made to cut the losses? Am I to believe that these workers will retain their jobs for the next two years while taxpayers' money goes to waste?
SUGAR INDUSTRY
Then, look at the sugar industry. I reckon that the government has pumped in at least 10 billion dollars during the past decade, but is the sugar industry in a healthier state now than before? How come the privately-owned and managed sugar factories make a profit while the public-owned companies demand subsidies and bailout from government? Well, the sugar industry is still a drain on the public purse. Would it not be in the best interests of Jamaica if we simply give away the whole industry to those who can run it better and at a profit?
What is best for Jamaica is still to be decided and remains an open question. I want Jamaica to be a place where my children and their children can work and contribute to the development of our beautiful paradise. It is the lack of vision that has taken us to this pitiful state. The vision for Jamaica, if we are truly serious, must be for us to become an economic powerhouse, with the factories, services and industries that can provide the jobs, opportunities and choices for ur people.
ECONOMIC POLICIES
Where is that vision to attract factories, industries and tourism services to our shores? Alas, the reverse has happened in the past ten years and more, and I warn that unless we reverse the present economic policies then there is no way going but down, and down, until we crash. Jamaica cannot continue on this path in which, ultimately, we import everything and export nothing. Yet, that is where the present economic policies are taking us.
It won't be long before we ask again what has gone wrong? The MOU is a nice public relations scoop, setting the stage for the partners for progress, in which everyone will be urged to join in. We are in this fiscal mess because of bad and predictable economic policies that, certainly, I warned in this column, could easily have been foreseen. Now, when things have gone awry, we are told, for the good of the country we must join in! Are we not going to sink even deeper into the economic abyss, if the same reckless economic policies are continued? What indications have we got that the government and Minister Davies are about to change economic course and do what's best for the country, so we don't need a public relations show, or an agreement, or a partnership, to join in we will simply fit in, because that's best for ourselves and Jamaica.
Delroy Chuck is an attorney-at-law and Opposition Member of Parliament. He can be contacted by e-mail at Delchuck@Hotmail.Com.
