Making the Hard Decisions

WHILE I am of the opinion that the government service here in Saint Lucia is too fat, I do not think that cutting healthcare workers is the way to start the trimming.

Government must make the hard decisions and this administration is trying to convince us that that is just what it is doing. They promised us all kinds of things to get themselves into office.

A certain administration (or should that be party? Sometimes the muddied lines make it difficult to differentiate.) boasts of having ‘a Contract of Faith’ with the populace but I would rather a Contract of Reality.

I am not one for manifestos or what I would rather call a pact of lies. I am for a bottom up approach to government. But, back to making hard decisions.

On which party’s manifesto have you seen or will you see cutting the public service by 50% (an arbitrary figure)? I hear about schools being merged and yet the government is saying that there will be no loss of teaching staff.

The logic just does not add up. One time I suggested the removal of religious (and one might say I am being disingenuous, I did say Catholic not religious) holidays off civil observance as a way to increase productivity. I was taken to task. I do not think I have had so much engagement under a Facebook status as I did under this one.

We will forever be in the doldrums of development if decision making is based solely on getting (back) into office come every election. We could see that the prime minister was walking on eggshells trying to explain the fate of workers at Victoria Hospital. (And just en passant… Did you notice that the press was not invited, talk about the glaring signs of dictatorship at work).

The government is selling us their propaganda wholesale and we have to be so careful what we swallow as truth. The truth is not what you believe it to be. If a glaring lie was ever spoken believe it is that the truth is what you believe it to be.

So government is privatizing healthcare and causing a lot of uneasiness in the country and while some of the people in the forefront of the debate are questionable, the trademark flaw of this administration is its lack of consultation with the people who matter most. The top down approach to governance is archaic and any government that practices it will soon find itself in the relics of history. If this administration continues on the trajectory it is on, it is sure to die a premature death.

I am no health expert but I am a recipient of healthcare. I am not of the persuasion that privatizing healthcare is the best option out and the idea of running government as a business is flawed. If you don’t believe me just keep the government doing what it is doing right now. My only fear is whether we will ever be able to recover from the failed state we are heading toward.