Editorial | Worry when the gangs unite

When the gangs of Gordon House readily agree on anything, like they do on the Constituency Development Fund (CDF), citizens should be wary. Taxpayers are very likely to be taken for a ride.

The CDF, for example, allocates J$20 million apiece to members of the gangs, the parliamentary representatives, to be spent largely at their discretion in their constituencies on initiatives which, presumably, demand urgent attention. Members of parliament (MPs), on both sides, love the scheme. At every opportunity, almost in unison across the aisle, they call for its expansion.

The J$20 million per MP, or the J$1.3 billion in total, allocated to the CDF may appear to be peanuts – too little to worry about in the context of the Government’s J$1-trillion annual Budget. Its danger, however, is not only in the dollar value of the scheme. Its corrosiveness lies in its perpetuation of the politics of patronage, upon which the gangs of Gordon House, and their members, thrive. Despite often-hollow protestations to the contrary, politicians not only get a say in who receives the benefits, but who delivers the service.

The antithesis to arrangements like the CDF, notwithstanding the oversight it claims to have, is a transparent and robust system of public procurement, where the proposed expenditure of taxpayers’ money is properly vetted before spending takes place. It must be clear that the resources will go not only to the projects to which they are allocated, but that the money will not be wasted. That is called accountability.

DOUGH TO FLOW

Politicians want the dough to flow.

So, most people, this newspaper included, were not surprised at the cross-party bleating at last week’s meeting of Parliament’s Public Administration and Appropriations Committee (PAAC) at the fact that J$6.5 billion allocated to capital projects would not be spent in the fiscal year that ends on March 31. The underexpenditure covers projects ranging from energy-efficiency programmes to the purchase of vessels for coastal surveillance, and a scheme to support the fight against HIV/AIDS.

No one wants unwarranted delays in spending on things that will improve the quality of people’s lives or help to drive growth in the national economy. What was curious, but not particularly shocking, about the PAAC session was that MPs were not particularly inclined to serious analyses of why specific projects could not be done this fiscal year. If they were, they were only cursorily so.

Rather, the committee members were keen to round on the Public Investment Appraisal Branch (PIAB), the arm of the finance ministry that undertakes pre-investment appraisal of projects and provides technical advice to ministries and departments, and on the Government’s procurement rules themselves.

The clear over- and undertones of government and opposition MPs were that the procurement regulations are too rigid and that the PIAB does not work fast enough to get off the ground projects that MPs want to see implemented for the benefit of constituents, and so that they can claim them (which was not stated) as personal achievements.

SITTING DUCKS

“We are sitting ducks at this point and we have capital expenditure projects that are not, and cannot, be executed,” wailed opposition member Lisa Hanna. First-term government MP Tova Hamilton wanted an “urgent review” of the procurement regulations.

The Gleaner is not opposed to a review of the procurement rules, although the financial secretary, Darlene Morrison, said that Jamaica’s regulations are “in line with international standards”. Even very good systems can be improved.

What stakeholders have to be vigilant against, however, is that whimperings, such as at the PAAC, are not used in the manufacture of a consensus for weakening the procurement regulations, and give greater ascendancy to patronage. Indeed, even with the existing regulations, there have been many investigative reports by anti-corruption bodies of how they appear to have been cynically sidestepped, bypassed or run roughshod over.

Like the procurement regime, we have no doubt that project evaluation and implementation can be made better. Indeed, we suspect that there is a shortage of those skills in the public sector. Serious discussion about these matters makes sense. Opening the larder to the gangs to perpetrate and perpetuate patronage does not.