Looking for leaders

December 13, 2009

Dear Sir,

Permit me via your medium to convey some sentiments in what I must term "an open letter to Parliamentarians". Having endured this past Session and its poor standard of debate I feel constrained to comment.

With every oration in the House commenced with the words "Mr. Speaker, I will only be brief... " the fundamental misunderstanding of an elected member's role is displayed. Parliamentarians, your constituents sent you to the House to speak, to advance those causes in which you share common beliefs. If in so doing your can be brief then so be it but to start in that vein creates an image that speaking in the House is somehow to be discouraged. It is what you do!

It seems to me, and I might add to many others, that the main feature of any day's debate is the interminable congratulatory and/or obituary statements. These pathetic ramblings congratulating everyone from the cat that got the canary to genuine achievements in society seem to have become the raison d'être for so many MPs. The voices of many Parliamentarians would never be heard but for this period. It is an embarrassing feature of our Legislature and speaks to an absence of gravitas that is made almost frightening in these difficult times.

There are no skilled orators in the Legislature any longer. A Horton shouts regularly at the nation, a Swan (or is it a country boy from St. George's?) rivals his volume while "thinking it not robbery" about anything. Add to that Hunt whose family somehow makes it into every debate, a shrieking Roban, a snide Moniz, an E.T. whose metaphors are simply "out to lunch" and Dame Lois could be forgiven for thinking that it has indeed now become "kindergarten".

It is possible to do better, sir. First, the men and women who are serving must become students of their game. Learn the rules, read more than whatever they're reading now and when next they travel, abandon the Mall and find a sister-Legislature somewhere and watch them at work for an hour. Then, prepare for the debate. And by prepare I mean research, make notes, be ready to defend and propose. Preparation is not tying the Dogs Act to the Dockyard cruise terminal, nor is it bringing legislation in need of grammatical changes.

Lastly, sir it is time for the best and the brightest to again be in public service. Imagine, where Dr. Gordon, Wesley Tucker, Dr. Cann, Dr. Stubbs, Ann Cartwright and E.T. (the real one) once sat, we're reduced to back slapping rhetoric more akin to the playing field than the House. talk of crystal balls and country boys is not a worthy heir to these men and women of distinction. This necessarily means by-elections; there are at least six in the Government alone who should be spending more time with their families sooner rather than later. They should lead by example and make way for the Young Turks we all know are chomping at the bit to improve not just the standard in the House but to set a new tone for the Country.

Their February 5 return looms and a Government sedated by its statistical lock on power, an Opposition who just will not listen to the clarion calls on why they continue to lose and the other guys whose suits are their only front bench material will trouble themselves with the little matter of the Budget. A friendly wager, sir, I bet not one of them, on either side will say the words "new revenue source'. Of course not, they will want to be brief.

A.S. SIMONS

Paget