EDITORIALS - What does Dr Hamilton mean?

We are surprised that Dr Rosalea Hamilton would find it vexatious for the Government to require that small businesses have up-to-date, audited accounts to qualify for some of its contracts.

Dr Hamilton, apart from teaching at the University of Technology, is president of an association of micro, small and medium-size enterprises, the MSME Alliance. She, therefore, has an obligation to protect and promote the interests of the MSME sector.

But that responsibility cannot only mean lobbying for policies that provide privileges to the sector, including the delivery of business on a platter. Even small businesses have to be accountable.

After all, people who operate small enterprises usually have ambitions of growing them into large ones. This, among other things, demands management and discipline, including keeping accounts which, at some point, are expected to be audited.

At the same time, when governments spend money, it is not the personal cash of ministers and bureaucrats. Those resources belong to taxpayers, who want their money spent judiciously. Rightly, they expect that firms which get contracts are able to deliver.

It is not enough for Dr Hamilton to claim that "because of the habits and realities" of the kinds of businesses on whose behalf her organisation speaks, "they cannot produce those accounts".

Some might well interpret it to be Dr Hamilton's view - which we do not think it is - that small enterprises need not have accounts and should be fed, without accountability, with contracts financed by taxpayer money. Or, that they need not pay taxes.

Dr Hamilton might find it useful to clarify her position.

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