That assessment from economist and former opposition leader Clyde Mascoll, MP for St. Michael North-West, and Minister of State in the Ministry of Finance, as he spoke in Parliament yesterday on a resolution to take note of the draft e-government strategy.
Noting that life was not about absolutes but about relativity, Mascoll said the environment for positive evolution of the public sector was already being created.
If you can create the environment which is being created in terms of restructuring the sugar cane sector, in terms of restructuring or repositioning the tourism sector, if that can happen, then what you are saying is that over time, the public sector as a proportion of the economy is going to shrink. And that is precisely what you are seeking to achieve because we all know that the engine of growth in any economy, has to be where the productive investment is occurring."
Mascoll added it was his hope that even the measurement of productivity would be enhanced by the e-government thrust.
"I therefore would hope that the work being done currently to allow the civil service to be able to measure the overall performance of the civil servants within the respective ministries, would be enhanced by this whole question of the adoption of e-government. Because it is the only way that we can go on a journey of overall improvement of the competitive edge of this Barbados economy, and by extension giving greater opportunity to the society at large.
Mascoll was critical of an opposition requiring 48 weeks notice to be able to fully appreciate the importance of the e-government process. He said government was responsible for human capital predominantly, and therefore had to see to it that primary school children got an opportunity to be exposed early to technology.
"Therefore, I can see no issue at all, why even in the absence of not being given 48 weeks of notice, why you cannot recognise the correlation between e-government and public sector reform. In fact, if you are truly thinking about preparing this society and this economy for the future, if you are truly thinking about becoming the next government, you don't have to have 48 weeks in order to appreciate the importance of e-government in this new economy. You don't have to have 48 weeks in order to understand why this is extremely critical to the whole process of public sector reform, and nothing is transformed unless there is a major event.
Quelle/Source: The Barbados Advocate, 26.07.2006
