Editorial | Serious Vale Royal Talks

Happily, it was all a misunderstanding. Everyone misapprehended Prime Minister Andrew Holness’ intention when he appeared to relegate Opposition Leader Mark Golding, negotiating first with the justice minister, Delroy Chuck, on constitutional reform.

All Dr Holness meant, based on his latest letter to the opposition, was for Mr Chuck – who now has responsibility for constitutional matters – to brief Mr Golding and his team about Mr Chuck’s ‘restructured ministry and portfolio’ ahead of substantive talks between the two leaders.

“To be clear, this invitation to meet with Minister Chuck is not a substitute for us meeting directly as political and Parliamentary leaders of our country,” Dr Holness told the opposition leader this week. “Nevertheless, Minister Chuck and the team at the Ministry of Justice and Constitutional Affairs look forward to meeting with you and/or your team.”

Indeed, Dr Holness has proposed a return to Vale Royal Talks format, named for the former prime ministerial residence/government protocol house, where Government and Opposition first formally met on hot-button issues, “providing space”, as the prime minister put it, “for frank dialogue and principled compromise”.

The Gleaner supports the Vale Royal frameworks and supports these talks in particular. We, however, note a concern and a proviso.

WON’T BE SYMBOLIC

While the discussions are unlikely to be held at the physical location of Vale Royal in the Kingston/St Andrew Golden Triangle region, the current state of the building, hopefully, won’t be symbolic of, or a metaphor for, the talks to be held in its name.

Vale Royal, and its grounds, insofar as is observable from outside, is in a shameful state of disrepair. The recent blue tarpaulin cover of a portion of its roof and frontage mirrored an inner-city tenement rather than a revered national monument. The long-promised refurbishing must be urgently undertaken.

Second, given that the talks will assume the Vale Royal format, as critical as that issue is, they should not be limited to only constitutional matters. The parties should identify issues on which there is consensus, or sensitive matters that ought to be removed from the cut-and-thrust of narrow partisanship.

The signal from Prime Minister Holness, so far, is that he hopes the talks to elicit Opposition support for Jamaica to proceed quickly to being a republic, while leaving for later the question of the island’s withdrawal from the colonial era, UK-based Privy Council as its final court and acceding to the Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ). The opposition wants the two things to happen simultaneously, or for the island to immediately join the CCJ, a constitutionally simpler exercise. Unlike this newspaper, Dr Holness isn’t in favour of succession to the CCJ. He says there is no consensus on the matter, neither nationally nor in his government.

Beyond the conundrum on the question of ditching King Charles as Jamaica’s head of state, and leaving the King’s court for the CCJ, it ought, by now, to be quite obvious that the previous constitutional reform exercise was a bust. The committee, whose report formed the basis for the constitutional bills for transitioning to a republic, failed to gain popular support or legitimacy.

FUNDAMENTAL RESET

There is a need for a fundamental reset, starting from scratch under non-political chairmanship. This process must include an intensive public education campaign, informing Jamaicans in detail about what exists in the current constitution.

At the Vale Royal Talks, Messrs Holness and Golding should agree on reform priorities, which might help inform how the new committee sequence its work and reports.

Additionally, the Vale Royal Talks must have on the agenda Jamaica’s deep crisis in education as well as the lumbering efforts at implementing the recommendations of the Orlando Patterson report on the sector’s reform.

There are as many recommendations (365) in the Patterson Report as there are days in the year. Recently, the committee that is overseeing their implementation said they were 30 per cent complete. More likely, they are ticking boxes rather than getting at the real priorities.

First, there has been no real national dialogue around the Patterson Report to get buy-in or consensus on what is critical and urgent. In any event, implementing 365 major substantial recommendations over three to five years, would, in any circumstance, be a major undertaking. In Jamaica’s case there are also financial and capacity constraints. Indeed, implementing even 10 priorities over three years would be stressful.

Nonetheless, given the island’s weak education outcomes and the need of an educated and trained workforce to help lift the economy out of its long-term funk, the mission, including how to get the best, and quickest, return on taxpayers’ limited resources is crucial. Beginning to get a handle on what are the real priorities and agreement on how they are funded must be high on the Vale Royal agenda.