It is no surprise that Derrick Kellier, the Opposition whip, is pained by the halving of that choice cut for MPs, the Constituency Development Fund (CDF).

Economic circumstances, of course, constrain Mr Kellier from falling into paroxysms of indignation. We expect, however, that it will be exceedingly difficult for other parliamentary colleagues, on both sides of the House, to restrain themselves. For, as we all know, it is hard for politicians to be weaned from pork - protestations notwithstanding that the CDF is the stuff of the troughs.

Be that as it may, if there is any immediate good to have emerged from the budgetary crisis, it is its effect on the constituency fund; that it has forced Prime Minister Golding to reduce the amount that politicians can get their hands on to $20 million, for a total fund of $1.26 billion. It should be nothing.

Indeed, it has long escaped us why it requires members of parliament, as was the case with the CDF's predecessor, the Social and Economic Support Programme (SESP), to be directly involved in the allocation and distribution of state resources to individuals. Or now, with the CDF, to be specifically and directly influential to the process.

On reflection, we do get it. Politics, in this circumstance, is not about grand designs, big ideas or overarching efforts to develop policies and programmes that create the environment that delivers growth to the benefit of the wider society.

Fundamentally, in this Jamaican context, it is about the distribution of largesse, the allocation of the spoils to the prevailing tribe and, increasingly as the politicians emerge as a distinct species, it is about the protection and survival of the group.

It is understandable, therefore, that our politicians of all stripes would rally about the SESP, and now CDF, and that Mr Kellier would urge that it be maintained and is relieved that, though reduced, it has survived. In this context, there is no difference between Mr Golding and Mr Kellier.

Common perspective and attitude

Mr Golding might do it with finesse and greater circumspection than his colleagues, but he and Mr Kellier and the rest of Gordon House have a perspective and attitude in common. Supposed accountability notwithstanding, they all, with chest-beating arrogance, declare how much of 'my constituency fund' was allocated to this or that project or individual. As if their benevolence is of a personal source, independent of its ownership by taxpayers.

This sequestering of resources to specialised agencies and units, outside of the normal frame or policy intervention and more easily accessed by direct political engagement, has one fundamental outcome, if not specific aim: the perpetuation of a paternalistic clientelism.

Our suggestion to Mr Golding, hard as it may be, is to rise above, and defeat, the instinct of the species to grope in the fat of the pork barrel and to be arbiter of the trough. This is as good an opportunity as any to close down the CDF and allocate the resources to the appropriate heads, to be accessed in the prescribed manner in the normal course of things. That is the better way.

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