Slippery slope - Government urged to fix problem rather than remove chairmanship of committees from Opposition
Published:Sunday | October 4, 2020 | 12:08 AMEdmond Campbell - Senior Staff Reporter
As the Andrew Holness administration’s position on retaking the chairmanship of several sessional committees of Parliament from the Opposition hardens, Lloyd Distant, president of the Jamaica Chamber of Commerce (JCC), has cautioned the Government not to abandon the oversight mechanism birthed by former Prime Minister Bruce Golding in 2007.
He argued that both sides of the political divide had agreed that the Golding doctrine of allowing the Opposition to chair sessional committees was the right way to go.
“If we think that these principles are in the best interest of the nation, then we should attempt to find a solution that embodies those principles but at the same time deliver the results that we all want to achieve,” the JCC president told The Sunday Gleaner.
“The introduction of the Oversight Committee mechanism with a clear and necessary role for the Opposition was a far-sighted step forward in the pursuit of transparency and accountability. While it hasn’t worked in many respects, let us not abandon the principle when we can fix it.”
A national debate has been sparked in the wake of the Government’s pronouncement that the sessional committees of Parliament, with the exception of the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) and the Public Administration and Appropriations Committee (PAAC), will now be chaired by government members of parliament.
When the changes were announced by the Government in Parliament on Tuesday, several Opposition members railed against the move.
Despite the administration’s insistence that the changes were part of wider reform of the Parliament, Distant said he is hoping that the Government takes a second look at the issue with a view to making adjustments.
“You always go down a slippery slope when you amend things for the moment because of the individuals or because things are not going as they ought to go,” he said.
The JCC head reasoned that while the Opposition chairpersons may have failed to carry out their duties, the onus was also on Government members to push for committee meetings to be held.
ABYSMAL PERFORMANCE
Newly appointed Leader of Government Business in the House of Representatives Edmund Bartlett told The Sunday Gleaner that ever since Bruce Golding changed the chairmanship of some of the sessional committees, the record showed an “abysmal performance” from Opposition chairpersons.
“I have the record to show that they did not perform on both sides,” he stated.
He said that only the PAAC and the PAC carried out extensive work.
Bartlett made it clear that both the Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) and the People’s National Party (PNP), when in Opposition, did very little to help advance government policy as chairpersons of the various sessional committees, such as Economy and Production, Internal and External, Infrastructure and Physical Development, as well as Human Resources and Social Development.
“Parliament is not about failing the Government. The Parliament is about supporting and enabling the Government to perform better – that is what the sessional committees are about. The behaviour and pattern were the same, that is why I am taking steps to reform that,” Bartlett insisted.
‘NONSENSE’
But PAC chairman and presidential aspirant for the PNP, Mark Golding, described Bartlett’s pronouncement as “nonsense”.
He said that the problem with the functioning of the parliamentary committees had to do with scheduling.
“There is one chamber in the Parliament building – Cabinet sits on a Monday so we can’t meet on that day. Parliament sits on Tuesday afternoon and sometimes on Wednesday afternoon. Most MPs are in their constituencies on Thursday and the Senate uses it on Friday,” Golding outlined.
Citing the critical role of the PAC and PAAC in providing oversight for government expenditure, Golding said that priority is given to these two committees to meet, and this makes it difficult for other committees to function effectively.
He accused the Holness administration of creating a facade to take back the chairmanship of the sessional committees.
“To my mind, this is materially a ruse or device by which the Andrew Holness Government in this term is seeking to renege on a commitment given by Bruce Golding in 2007, which was implemented and followed ever since.”
With support coming from the Jamaica Chamber of Commerce, the Jamaica Council of Churches and the National Integrity Action for the Government to reconsider its position, Golding said he was pleased that debate on this issue was not just confined to parliamentarians.
“We are a democracy and our democratic traditions and way of life enure to the benefit of all stakeholders in the society, including the business community, so anything which would tend to be a regressive step and erode progress that has been made to strengthen our democracy should be resisted by civil society robustly,” said Golding.
In a statement, the Jamaica Council of Churches (JCC) noted that “good governance is both a gift from and the will of God and that it is the duty of those who are called to govern to do so with utmost care and discernment.”
The JCC added, “We also affirm the value of time-honoured traditions and conventions pertaining to accountability, transparency and probity in the mechanisms of governance of our democratic system.”
NOT CONCRETISE
While Bruce Golding introduced the chairmanship of some sessional committees during his tenure as prime minister, he did not concretise this move by amending the Standing Orders to reflect the then new approach in 2007.
His idea of creating greater transparency and accountability in government with the Opposition chairing a number of committees was embraced by Holness in his first stint as prime minister in 2011. The Portia Simpson Miller administration came to power in 2011 and continued the tradition, which was also adopted by Holness when he received his first mandate from Jamaicans in 2016.
However, in 2018, controversial lawmaker Everald Warmington moved a motion to reverse Golding’s 2007 decision that allows the Opposition to chair oversight committees. After strong resistance from the Opposition benches, Warmington retreated and withdrew the motion.
SESSIONAL COMMITTEES MEETINGS FROM 2012 – 2020
COMMITTEES YEAR NUMBER OF MEETINGS
PAAC 2012 22
2013 25
2014 19
2015 20
2016 15
2017 23
2018 23
2019 23
2020 17
Internal and External Affairs 2012 1
2013 6
2014 1
2015 8
2016 2
2017 3
2018 6
2019 3
2020 0
Economy and Production 2012 2
2013 3
2014 7
2015 3
2016 3
2017 3
2018 1
2019 1
2020 1
Human Resources and Social
Development 2012 7
2013 6
2014 4
2015 3
2016 7
2017 3
2018 1
2019 9
2020 2
Infrastructure and Physical
Development 2012 5
2013 4
2014 3
2015 5
2016 4
2017 3
2018 3
2019 2
2020 0
PAC 2012 9
2013 7
2014 11
2015 6
2016 4
2017 2
2018 9
2019 16
2020 9