cognitivedissonance:

“Papa” John Schnatter, Papa John’s founder and CEO, is back in the headlines once more for his assertion that there’s no way on God’s green Earth he can afford to provide health care for a portion of his employees, as mandated by the Affordable Care Act. Now, Schnatter hasn’t been hurting for…

What a refreshing read this was about the simple side of Trinbagonian life that I - for one - have never seen.

That is, until I scrolled down to the bottom and read this comment:

Acting President Timothy Hamil-Smith has noticed that something is awry in our governmental system:

 “As currently constituted our parliamentarians are overburdened and therefore cannot perform at optimum levels and as a result our committee system, which is a vital oversight mechanism, does not function as it should. This will require that in considering constitutional reform, the following matters need to be taken into account: a professional Parliament. We demand professionalism from our parliamentarians yet engage them on a part-time basis. It is essential that all parliamentarians be engaged on a full-time basis.”

He said ministers were required to perform multiple functions which would be impossible for any single individual to satisfactorily fulfil, from ministerial operations and Cabinet participation to committee meetings, Parliament and MP duty and other responsibilities.

For a while now, I’ve been asking why our Cabinet Ministers and MPs are essentially the same people. How is one person supposed to effectively serve a ministry and constituency? I’m aware that past ministers have accomplished it, but is it a reasonable expectation? Aren’t we dooming them to failure?

Of course, I recognize that Parliamentary positions are elected and Cabinet positions are often distributed as rewards for party service, but that’s clearly not working out. How about, people interested in serving the country on the ground go up for elections and those with specialized expertise can serve in their relevant fields? 

Just a suggestion.

Anyway, here are Hamil-Smith’s suggestions for improving our Parliament so that we don’t have a recurrence of Section 34:

• Parliament should introduce large screens so members can see each clause of a bill and any amendment of it. The current system in which amendments are merely called out over the floor of the House is inefficient and prone to error.

• An electronic register of undertakings and assurances to record and monitor  assurances given by parliamentarians and their implementation of such undertakings and assurances.

• The Clerk of the House should certify whether undertakings and assurances have been satisfied. A certificate would  be attached to bills sent to the President for proclamation. This would avert the President proclaiming legislation without the prerequisites being fulfilled.

• Hire at least two permanent professionals to advise members on legislative and financial matters. In more developed parliaments, advisers are assigned to each parliamentarian. Our Parliament cannot afford this but should be in a position to hire two well qualified professionals.

• A management information system allowing for a single platform for seamless preparation and finalisation of legislation, from initial drafting through all the stages of executive approval and parliamentary review and amendment and ultimately ending with publication. The present system is inefficient and likely error prone.

• Increasing the number of non-executive parliamentarians. Recommendations of the Royal Commission in New Zealand which considered this issue suggest that T&T require a minimum of 100 non-executive parliamentarians.

I will leave it to better educated heads than I to determine whether these are viable/meaningful solutions or whether we just need to scrap the whole Westminster system all together. (Personally, I vote for the latter. Even the folks who invented Westminster don’t use it anymore.)

This is why the media is important:

On the heels of the repeal of the controversial Clause 34 legislation, comes the revelation that the Government is proposing to amend the Police Complaints Authority (PCA) Act, which could give the line minister influence over it, which could contribute to the erosion of its independence. This comes from PCA director Gillian Lucky, who described the proposal as “objectionable” and vowed to challenge it, all the way to the Privy Council or the Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ). Addressing an audience in San Fernando on Tuesday night, Lucky called on all conscientious citizens to help prevent the amendment from becoming law, rather than becoming reactionary, after the fact. 

Speaking at public outreach meeting of the PCA at City Hall, San Fernando, before an audience which included Public Administration Minister Carolyn Seepersad-Bachan, under whose portfolio the organisation falls, Lucky said she wanted to place her concern on record. “There is a clause being bandied about, to go to the Parliament in a bill, that would suggest that the minister is responsible for the PCA, and I want to make it clear, there is no minister who is responsible for the PCA,” she said. “There is a minister who is a conduit, but there is a move to have a clause which goes against the grain of the section, already in our act, which means the very purpose of the PCA is being undermined.”

 She emphasised that the PCA is an independent body. “The act says it is not subject to control or direction of any person in the performance of its function or exercise of powers,” Lucky said. “But I want to assure you, the PCA can never be a runaway horse, because at the end of the day, we have to account to the Parliament, the Auditor General and to the people of Trinidad and Tobago. “What is clear is that there can be no political interference in the operation of the body, and that is something that really speaks to independence in T&T, the ability to be accountable and transparent, without any kind of outside influence dictating how we operate.”

Somehow, I doubt that this will get much traction until it’s too late.