Fighting by MPs at national level…Escalation due to Govt. offenders not being dealt with condignly – Greenidge

Sep 10, 2014 News

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“Their comments in the National Assembly include rudeness, untruths and slander. The minority government is just a nuisance and should be treated as such.”

By Kiana Wilburg

Some opposition members have disagreed with House Speaker, Raphael Trotman, who had expressed that while fighting by Members of Parliament (MPs) is a frightening prospect, it is the primary reason the tenth Parliament has underperformed.
Specifically, A Partnership for National Unity’s (APNU) financial spokesman, Carl Greenidge, gave his take on the Speaker’s comments in this regard.

Trotman had stated that in terms of legislation, the House is passing laws but as a collective, he does not believe that they are passing as many as they should. He said that the House is meeting the minimum standard of being a legislative chamber.
Greenidge however, stated that all the laws that one would have expected to be passed are not because the Government recognizes that it does not have a majority of MPs and is not prepared to formulate its proposals in a manner that would attract Opposition support. He said that they prefer to only submit the barest minimum of Bills.
He strongly contended that the amount of Bills that should have been passed has nothing to do with fighting between Members of Parliament.
“We should not behave as though we are operating without a Party system. MPs cannot individually agree to compromises that buck the instructions passed on by the Parties.  So I do not see how one can blame the MPs for this,” the former finance minster asserted.
Though he singled out Greenidge and praised him at length for his “excellent work” with the Public Accounts Committee, the House Speaker had said that when it comes to general oversight of the government, other committees may not have been as vibrant and effective. One such committee, he cited, was the Parliamentary Sectoral Committee on Natural Resources.
“When it comes to providing oversight over government, I don’t think that we have done as good a job as we should have. The committee system is in place, but we have a difficulty where our Members of Parliament (MP) for the most part are part-time ones and they are expected to perform full-time functions,” Trotman had said.

Greenidge agreed, but noted that there are a number of reasons for the weaknesses the Speaker has identified, not least of which is the unwillingness of Government to either make material available or to adjust policy to take account of Opposition and public concerns.
Elaborating on the House Speaker’s comments on the not-so-vibrant work of some parliamentary committees, Greenidge outlined that many matters raised in Parliament are ignored until the press recognizes their importance or finds a sensational headline.
On the other hand, he did admit that it is true that not enough Opposition MPs are equipped and willing to take on the tasks expected of them.
“In the Committees I chair, MPs on both sides work. However, the work is uneven and not enough questions are asked, not enough MPs read the material they receive and a majority of them are probably not familiar with the issues which can be very technical. The political parties and those on the Opposition side need to accept that they have a responsibility to bear skill needs in mind when they chose MPs from their lists, and when they assign persons to Committees. That is not always evident, and in that regard the Government side has a big advantage, because they seem to have organized briefings and they have been in the house for longer periods,” the politician added.
As it relates to repairing the image of the Parliament, Trotman had said that he does not agree with some critics that it is but a mere rubber stamp. However, Greenidge opines that this image is almost unavoidable.
“A parliament works within limited rules. It cannot lock up criminals, for example, and unfortunately, most Guyanese seem to believe that it should. The failure of Parliament is in mobilizing its muscles at the party levels to support parliamentary work with extra-parliamentary pressure.  Apart from lack of civility in the Parliament, I do not think that the House has anything to be ashamed about. Electorates are becoming impatient with Parliaments all over the world. They want them to constrain Governments and not be rubber stamps, but they also want less confrontation. They cannot have both. The failure here is on the party front, not so much in the House,” Greenidge said.
While Trotman had said that he doesn’t believe the house has become a rubber stamp, since government now complains of not getting its way in the tenth parliament as opposed to getting its way in the past, he did note that he will make efforts to get the MPs to engage in better ways of handling their problems.
“But at the end of the day, the image the citizens get is one of disagreement, discord and fighting, and as House Speaker, there isn’t much I can do. I try to maintain order and remind our MPs that we have people watching on, but if people want to go at each other in personal ways in the Assembly there is very little that I can do,” Trotman had noted.
He had emphasized that repairing the image requires a collective effort by both government and opposition.
Greenidge said that he agrees that there is little respect in Parliament and has said before that as a former Minister, he had never heard Government MPs, including Ministers, refer to other MPs in a certain manner.
“Their comments in the Assembly include rudeness, untruths and slander. This largely occurs when Government proposals are opposed. Offenders are not always dealt with condignly. It therefore leads to escalation. The Speaker and I have had words on this. It is unacceptable and often hides the lack of arguments on the other side. The minority government is just a nuisance and should be treated as such. When Ministers change their attitude of contempt for others, things will change.”
Greenidge insisted that no new Government will be able to behave in that manner, because it is precisely that approach which has caused the PPP to lose public support.
“We should not behave as though there is something perverse or unusual in the character of current MPs. On the Opposition side, they recognize that they are a majority and expect their views and votes to be respected. They will not accept that abuse and dismissal is all they deserve because they are only a majority of one,” the Parliamentarian asserted.

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