Every day is a new op­por­tu­ni­ty to start afresh. Change is eas­i­er for an in­di­vid­ual, even more dif­fi­cult for an or­gan­i­sa­tion and an in­cred­i­bly com­plex un­der­tak­ing for a coun­try. Gov­ern­ments are elect­ed to im­prove on the per­for­mance of the out­go­ing ad­min­is­tra­tion. If the par­ty in of­fice is suc­cess­ful, then they will be giv­en a sec­ond term to con­tin­ue the im­prove­ment. That the coun­try needs to change di­rec­tion is be­com­ing in­creas­ing­ly ob­vi­ous. It can­not be busi­ness as usu­al. The crime sit­u­a­tion con­tin­ues to de­te­ri­o­rate as the ev­i­dence mounts that the gang cul­ture and a pro­tec­tion rack­et are grow­ing stronger as our in­sti­tu­tions de­te­ri­o­rate. The same is true for the coun­try’s eco­nom­ic per­for­mance. Ab­sent the in­crease in en­er­gy and petro­chem­i­cal prices in 2022 and the coun­try would still be in a de­pres­sion.

Apart from a few mi­nor ini­tia­tives, the 2024 Bud­get speech re­hashed sev­er­al old ideas and dis­pensed enough pop­ulist mea­sures to give the ap­pear­ance of im­prove­ment and that the Gov­ern­ment was hard at work. There was no new pol­i­cy di­rec­tion, no at­tempt to mea­sure the suc­cess of cur­rent poli­cies or on­go­ing ini­tia­tives. Apart from self-con­grat­u­la­to­ry rhetoric, there was no ini­tia­tive or com­ment on the Gov­ern­ment's ef­fort to im­prove its ad­min­is­tra­tive ma­chin­ery.

On Fri­day last the Chief Jus­tice added his voice to the few who have iden­ti­fied the need for ad­min­is­tra­tive re­form. No coun­try can move faster than the pace of its pub­lic ser­vice. If the pub­lic ser­vice is in­ef­fi­cient, or not fit for pur­pose, then the op­por­tu­ni­ties for growth will be stymied or still­born and moved else­where. A coun­try’s de­vel­op­ment de­pends on the dy­namism and in­no­va­tion of its peo­ple. This does not hap­pen by ac­ci­dent. It re­quires well-craft­ed poli­cies which must be re­in­forced by dis­ci­plined rou­tines, sys­tems and pro­ce­dures and a com­mit­ment to ex­cel­lence. Un­for­tu­nate­ly, this is not our re­al­i­ty.

This is not the first time that the Chief Jus­tice has called for pub­lic sec­tor re­form, cer­tain­ly as it re­lates to op­er­a­tions of the ju­di­cial branch. It may well be the first time that he was so di­rect and clear in ar­tic­u­lat­ing the need for a dif­fer­ent ap­proach to the ad­min­is­tra­tion of jus­tice. His com­ments echo sim­i­lar sen­ti­ments ex­pressed pub­licly by the Di­rec­tor of Pub­lic Pros­e­cu­tions in ad­dress­ing the op­er­a­tions of that of­fice.

Many have point­ed to the de­cline in the op­er­a­tions of the pub­lic ser­vice as the coun­try has grown and be­come more com­plex. The pub­lic ser­vice ex­pand­ed part­ly to act as a sponge to ab­sorb labour with­out im­prov­ing ser­vice de­liv­ery. As the ser­vice re­quire­ments have in­creased the mea­sure­ment and con­trol sys­tems have not im­proved com­men­su­rate­ly or as fast.

It must be recog­nised that change is nev­er easy, nor does it pro­ceed quick­ly. There must be a plan and for the plan to work there must be ac­tion. The gap be­tween state­ment and per­for­mance is ac­tion. There have been many state­ments. The TTRA has fig­ured in every bud­get since 2012 as has trans­fer pric­ing. Yet the ac­tion to make ei­ther a re­al­i­ty has not hap­pened. Pub­lic sec­tor re­form or re­me­di­a­tion on the oth­er hand is an or­phan, and is gen­er­al­ly ig­nored.

Tack­ling the crime prob­lem is a mul­ti­fac­eted op­er­a­tion. Fix­ing the ad­min­is­tra­tive ma­chin­ery will have a big­ger im­pact for each dol­lar spent than hir­ing 1,000 new po­lice re­cruits. If the ma­chin­ery is not work­ing, hir­ing more peo­ple to place greater de­mands on the same sys­tem is counter-pro­duc­tive.