Missing links

However, many would suggest that in the dissemination of this information, that the communication personnel undertake a careful scan of the messages, to have them come from more pertinent portfolios. True the Prime Minister is the boss, but quite a lot of his messaging last night could have been delivered by his Minister of Labour, or Energy, or Finance, leaving the Prime Minister to utilise his office and considerable political capital to address the wider political-economy issues that have material bearing on the economy.

One such issue is the need for a wage policy for the country. In spite of the free play of market forces, the intervention in the labour market has been limited and ineffective. On the other hand, the system of wage adjustment has turned wages into a largely dysfunctional mechanism as factor prices, and highly inequitable as factor incomes. While we have dealt with a national minimum wage, the need for evolving a national wage policy has to be based on additional principles such as rationalising the wage criteria and wage differentials, and making wage adjustment functional.

Approaching wages as incomes rather than prices and attempting a workable wage productivity link-up, is an issue that this government should have been dealing with as a priority since assuming office. Surely speaking to the key elements making up a framework of such a policy is badly needed now. Had a wages policy been in place such theatrics would not have been the order of the day, since all stakeholders would have contributed to its establishment. This is political economy in action.

Concomitant with the wages policy has to be a rationalisation of the employment numbers at the Petrotrin for instance.

There are some who think that the company may be over staffed by as many as two or three times its required workforce.

Surely, the days of using the company as an employment agency to address the shortage of capital endowment is long over.

Unemployment levels remain low. Now was the time to address the issue and show leadership.

It would have helped Petrotrin’s bottom line.

Last night’s address could also have been a vehicle to discuss the National Plan with the many attendant questions. For instance, what priority is given to oil exploration? How important is it? What initiatives are being undertaken given the coming on line of the Juniper fields to have successful exploration identify more successful finds that can signal replacement fields to come on line in the future. After all, the PM could have outlined what was required to mitigate the fall in production in oil and gas and how long that would take. Having prefaced the difficulties faced in the energy sector the PM should have spoken of the need to use what was left of this sector as a buffer to provide our national plan with the time for economic transformation including diversification.

The Prime Minister told us about the Bonds used to finance the refinery. Did any of these bonds have a call option that suggested if the debt/GDP ratio changed there could be a call on these? What would happen to the reserves? What is the plan for repayment of these bonds from 2019? What is happening to the level of contingent liability of the government? We appreciate the information but there were indeed some missing links.