Ronald Thwaites | A permanent job

I am sorry for Minister Christopher Tufton. The repairs to the Cornwall Regional Hospital (CRH) have failed to be delivered on time and on budget, and he is taking a serious ‘cussing’ for trying to blame this on incompetent contractors. To a person, they have fired back, pointing to “bureaucratic bungling” by officers of the State who give inadequate scoping, impose confusing variations, and clog progress by tardy paperwork.

I am sorry for the minister because I know what it is like to think you have your portfolio under control, only to find that personnel in one’s ministry or a related agency are not performing and there is very little that you can do about it.

Why? Because most public servants are permanently employed, protected by archaic staff orders which render them substantially unaccountable. Add to that an ingrained bias against productivity among too many of us, who feel that deadlines and strict accountability for outcomes are fetters to freedom and personal autonomy.

Sometimes I would sit in the lobby to observe and greet those who came in. Punctuality is clearly unrelated to keeping your job in Jamaica. “ Why you think I must work out my soul case for that little money. And everybody knows I live in Old Harbour”.

Additionally, we can be careless about cost overruns because no one is ever sanctioned – even for ‘teefing’ – and it is government’s money anyway and there is always supposed to be more of that.

So Chris, who is responsible for everything, ends up being fed impossible timelines and cost estimates for the CRH. The Opposition is now baying for his head, he and his colleagues will become defensive, and the people in the west will linger without full hospital facilities..

A similar situation is brewing in education. The minister clearly wants to return to a safe level of face-to-face learning, but is likely to be stymied by the teachers’ union and some parents, who fail to understand how much the loss of school time will hurt their children. But when the silent ‘pop-down’ in performance becomes inescapably evident, they, the same ones, will blame minister and government. Look at the obstacles being raised to prevent thorough reform of the Education Code. Efficient functioning and personal behaviour remain detached.

Get to any of the political directorate in unguarded conversation and you will hear how they can propose and pose, but to get things done efficiently is a big problem. In her time, that was Mrs Thatcher’s complaint about the British apparatus. She lost her job partly because of her insistence on correction. The UK has undertaken major public service realignment since then. We have chosen to remain shackled to the main foundations of the colonial establishment.

Our long-time-ago reformer of state structures, Dr George Eaton, felt it was of the nature of bureaucracy to be involuted and dilatory. But that can be no comfort to us, a country with exalted aspirations and limited resources. It is too expensive to leave things as they are. Check the hospital.

In almost 60 working years, I have never had a permanent work. You either performed a given, measured task at a reasonably satisfactory level or you were replaced. And there was no place to plead fear of being hauled before a parliamentary committee to excuse less-than-zealous application.

MEASURE OF INSURANCE

Security of tenure is a measure of insurance against predatory politics . That is necessary, sadly essential, in a hopelessly tribal political culture. But when it becomes an enemy of productivity, the purpose has been defeated.

In recent times, there has been a high official, credibly accused of being a sexual abuser, who remains in his permanent work – that is a vacant post to which he has been appointed – because some iota of disciplinary procedure was not observed. Similar cases are plentiful.

So please don’t expect too much accountability, beyond the hapless minister, for the expensive shortfalls at Cornwall Regional Hospital or for the waste which resides in government expenditure. I found out quickly why there was no interest in my proposal that we should adopt a system of zero budgeting over time. Too much ‘permanent work’, and its perquisites would be on the line.

To be fair, the problem of a weak work ethic and complacency with low total factor productivity is not universal in the public service. There are thousands who give of their best to the national cause for very little recompense. It is their considerable sacrifice which keep us going. The point is that we cannot afford to tolerate the ‘sleepers’. The Budget is short, the needs are multiplying, and the waste is obvious.

Dr Nigel Clarke is responsible for the long-postponed reform of the public sector. What are his proposals in this period of wage negotiation? There is no hope of meeting national growth targets if major areas of production and service delivery remain tethered to the notion of a permanent work.

Stability and remuneration must be related to productivity. Right now, the good, bad and indifferent performers in any given post get the same reward. The annual evaluation of many classes of workers comes back glowing every year, even as service outcomes deteriorate or remain stagnant. Check many schools.

So what are the foundations of our attitudes towards work? What will cause us to deserve our job stability rather than it being accorded to us, almost as an entitlement? Now that trade unions have lost their teeth and are no longer instigators of progress, the political establishments are afraid of vested interests; civil society has a narrow focus and the universities are slumbering, who will lead the broad and persuasive discussion required to realign attitudes?

There really isn’t much time. As we dawdle, regressive practices prevail and more permanent posts are created.

Rev Ronald G. Thwaites is an attorney-at-law. Send feedback to columns@gleanerjm.com.