Easier path to community engagement

IN FINDING their way around the labyrinth of Mark Golding’s shadow Cabinet, Natalie Neita-Garvey and Patricia Duncan Sutherland, especially, will have to be careful against tripping over each other. Gabriella Morris, too, has to be wary.

For when Mr Golding, the leader of the opposition People’s National Party (PNP), restructured the shadow Cabinet a fortnight ago, Ms Neita-Garvey was appointed the spokesperson for local government and participatory democracy. Ms Duncan Sutherland was given the portfolio of social transformation and social protection. Ms Morris oversees youth and civic engagement.

But the obvious overlaps are not nearly as great nor as confusing as they seem, Mr Golding suggests. Rather, the portfolios signal a future PNP government’s intent to strengthen participatory democracy by bringing government closer to people and communities, and lessening the focus on the 84 people who sit in the House of Representatives and the Senate, where power is overly concentrated.

The current arrangement, Mr Golding told this newspaper, contributes much to the disaffection that alienates vast swathes of Jamaicans from politics, so that only 37.85 per cent of registered electors voted in the 2020 general election, continuing a trend of decline in recent years.

“This (apathy) is part of the problem of politics in modern Jamaica and the growing crisis of political legitimacy in the country….,” Mr Golding said. “People yearn for creative mechanisms by which they can both shape decisions which impact on their daily lives, and influence what happens in Parliament.”

There is not much, if anything, on which to disagree with Mr Golding’s observations. Except that he is unlikely to solve the conundrum with an overstuffed shadow Cabinet, or government, where ministers are busy negotiating with each other, and parsing each development, to determine whether a matter falls in their portfolio.

TWO EASIER OPTIONS

So, if Mr Golding is serious about bringing decisionmaking closer to where outcomes affect people, as well as affording citizens greater access to the legislature for them to influence its work, he has two easier options than a babel of a Cabinet room. One is steering parish governments to operate more like they were intended to do in the 2016 reforms. The other would be to liberate members of parliament for a higher level of discourse and debate in Parliament, while ensuring that its committees become more engaged with the public.

With respect to the operation of Parliament, there are some easy things a government can do to help lift it out of its funk and improve people’s respect for the institution.

First, the institution has to be cured of its laziness, or hypersomnia.

On a good year, Parliament, with MPS who now earn over J$14 million annually, sits perhaps for 50 days, for a few afternoon hours, mostly one day for the week. And the sessions usually get off to a late start. Some members also occasionally attend committee meetings.

In 2024 New Zealand’s parliament is slated to sit for 84 days, determined by a committee ahead of time. Another 10 days, in June and October, will be dedicated to all-day committee hearings to scrutinise the functioning of the executive and the country’s finances. Jamaica might borrow from New Zealand.

Jamaica’s parliamentary backbenchers, especially those of a governing party, hardly ever contribute to debates. They are relegated to thumping desks in support of ministers. The Standing Orders should be reformed to loosen the rigidities that limit participation, as well as to provide specific periods of the debate of private members’ motions and bills.

PREVIOUS ARRANGEMENT

Importantly, too, Parliament should revert to the previous arrangement, which should be cemented in the Standing Orders, of key committees being chaired by opposition MPs. And those chairmen should be allowed freer rein to follow up on, and/or investigate matters relating to their portfolios, including make it easier for the public to attend, and testify at their hearings.

With respect to local government, liberation starts with ending the vassalship of municipal councillors to the MPs in whose constituencies their divisions fall, especially if they are of the same party. The first step here is recruiting more competent and intellectually engaged candidates for local government representation.

While the operations of municipal authorities may be circumscribed by an overly interfering minister, who has control over most of their financial flows, ambitious and creative local government leaders with similarly ambitious councils can achieve far more than what they seemingly presume is possible.

The law specifically calls for community engagement by parish governments. They “shall”, it says, “promote, establish and utilise appropriate mechanisms to facilitate participation of, and collaboration or networking with, all relevant stakeholders who exist or operate in their areas of jurisdiction”.

Further, municipal corporations can appoint nonelected members to their committees. Their public accounts committees, which review accountability standards, are obligated to be chaired by a nonelected nominee drawn from a properly registered community or civil society groups operating in the jurisdiction.

The local government system has a decent conceptual foundation that can be built on. Which Mr Golding no doubt hopes to pursue, given his role in 2015 of helming the legislative efforts to recognise local government in Jamaica’s Constitution.