Holness more comfortable at crease

Daniel Thwaites

Jamaica has been near-bankrupt for many years. After brilliantly executing, then equally miserably squandering the JDX, it became clear that Audley was dodging phone calls from the creditor without a clue as to how to effectuate recovery. At that point, The Gleaner began a series of well-written and well-researched editorials to pound home the message that we had borrowed money beyond all proportion to our real capacity to repay it, with debt at near 150 per cent of GDP.

Audley's relationship with the IMF had become toxic, and any few scraps of international credibility that may have survived the West Kingston mess were being killed off by outright hostility between the Government and the IMF, World Bank, and IDB.

I believe that in the psychotherapeutic world, it's called 'hitting rock bottom'.

The newspaper also identified a potential road to recovery. Post-election, it asked Portia to leverage her own popularity, explain the need for, and enact, fiscal discipline as never before seen, and lead the charge for tax and pension reform. That part about leveraging popularity is the subtext of any talk about fiscal consolidation in our context. We all know that our tinderbox could explode relatively easily.

I think The Gleaner is mostly having its way. The aggressive target of a 7.5 per cent fiscal surplus is audacious, and this is happening without the country, so far, being set alight. That is largely, I believe, because of Portia's unique political assets and savvy. Who else on the political landscape, or even near it, could achieve this?

Sometimes we do get what we ask for, or something close enough to it. Of course, the pension- and tax-reform parts might be on the 'soon come' timetable - just look at what the mere mention of needing to talk about leave entitlements has unearthed in education.

The other side to the equation is that it wasn't as if there was much choice, and everyone knows this. For his part, when Mr Holness spoke about the need for "bitter medicine", it caused me to perk up and pay attention, because the candour was refreshing. It was an encouraging sign that he needn't be a small-bore politician, but might have the courage to stalk a bigger agenda, particularly as he grows more comfortable in his crease.

responsible Opposition

I happened to meet Mr Holness at the Jamaica 50 celebrations last year, and I raised it with him, saying that the next couple of years would be a sticky wicket for any administration. He explained that in his view, the PNP would become more cloistered and narrow, whereas the JLP would open up. He also relayed his intention to lead a responsible Opposition.

On the latter point, I countered that there were worrying signs in the other direction already. Then, as now, some members had smoothly transitioned - pivoted - from Government to Opposition (and vice versa), saying the exact opposite of what they had been saying a few weeks earlier.

Holness quickly responded: "We're not promising 'nightmares' or anything like that." Ouch! OK. Him root up mi miggle stump! Well played, sir! But I wasn't done yet. The proof, I said, would be in the next Budget, not in the 2012 one just presented.

Well, having seen the 2013 debate, it was a mix from Mr Holness. There was a fair deal of poppycock, as if the economic crisis began in 2012. But we're not looking for perfection here. Mr Holness pointedly did not adopt a tone of mindless belligerence. He put out some ideas that deserve attention and has continued to do that since then. Moreover, he outlined a positive vision of Government. It wasn't particularly novel, but he was willing to do it, evincing some thoughtfulness.

THE VAZ CONTRIBUTION

I also feel that Daryl Vaz made an important contribution in the Sectoral Debate when he continued to pursue a theme he has been on since his time in Government, namely, disposing of the red tape and bureaucratic blockages that are a part of getting any business done with the Government.

Shortly after assuming leadership in late 2011, Mr Holness had assigned Vaz the specific task of seeing to public-sector efficiency. Those weren't great times for business either. At that time, in 2011, Jamaica had just nosedived 12 places in the World Economic Forum's latest Global Competitiveness Report as a place with a competitive environment for doing business, and also slipped in the World Bank's Doing Business Report, which charts the ease of doing business.

Mr Vaz clearly took his assignment seriously, and although perched on the Opposition bench, has continued to give the problem thought. He now suggests an online facility to deal with development applications, considering licensing private entities to grant approval for certain types of developments, and a system where applicants can deem applications to have been approved if they do not hear from the authority they have been submitted to within 90 days.

Some of this will sound like the rankest heresy to the believers that Government is the answer to all problems. Nevertheless, I think it's a reasonable response to a bureaucracy that has proven immensely resistant to reform.

When Vaz says he wants the "overhauling of the public sector, which is strangled by inefficiency and archaic legislation and regulations which have no place in a globalised economic environment", he's making sense to me. When he diagnosed "a mentality of finding every reason why things can't be done rather than making it our job to facilitate getting things done", he's mining gold. I continue to hope, naively perhaps, that good ideas from the Opposition can filter across the aisle.

Let's see if Minister Anthony Hylton's proposed super form achieves some of these goals. The danger is, of course, that it just creates another step in an endless and Byzantine process. The investment ministry ought to be tracking exactly how long it takes a project to go from concept to approval, how many man-hours, and how many stops on the Government circuit.

Says Vaz: "At present, the process is beset by too much red tape, is too complex, unwieldy and a major disincentive to investment, business and job creation." Amen, Pastor Daryl! Amen!

Daniel Thwaites is a partner of Thwaites Law Firm in Jamaica, and Thwaites, Lundgren & D'Arcy in New York. Email feedback to columns@gleanerjm.com.