Golding

SIX MONTHS after Prime Minister Bruce Golding announced that his administration would take a pay cut, an examination of parliamentary records reveals that the symbolic gesture has saved the country $8.9 million.

Golding, whose monthly basic salary as prime minister is $566,299, has forgone $509,669 in salary over the period. Those crumbs from the prime minister's table over the six months would be more than enough to pay his chauffeur, whose basic salary is $423,616 per year, or $35,301 per month.

Yesterday, political commentator Richard Crawford said the savings from government pay cuts were peanuts, but nonetheless important.

every million dollar counts

"I would not celebrate it, but in this climate, every million dollar counts," Crawford said.

Karl Samuda, general secretary of the governing Jamaica Labour party (JLP), told The Sunday Gleaner that the party was unaware of how Jamaicans now viewed the savings from the salary cuts of government members.

"I have not done a poll to determine whether people feel that what we have done merits any sort of equal treatment by them," Samuda told The Sunday Gleaner yesterday.

The JLP general secretary said the pay cut was "to signal to the country that we sympathise with the plight of the workers, that we recognise the difficulty the country is undergoing, and that we want to play our part in a very symbolic way".

Robert Pickersgill, chairman of the opposition People's National Party (PNP), refused to comment on the savings from the government's salary cuts. He said the party had already made its comments on the matter and added that Golding should honour his pre-election commitment and reduce the size of his Cabinet.

However, Crawford said that despite the savings, the Government had missed out on capitalising on the move.

"The symbolic gesture of the pay cut by MPs has been wasted, because while they have taken theirs, and while they have asked public-sector employees to hold on to their salaries and not to expect any increase, this has been done in a very haphazard way," Crawford said. "There is no consistency, and there is very little dialogue between the government and the workers," he added.

At present, Jamaican taxpayers, pay a minimum of $12 million monthly to Golding and his Cabinet. The opposition People's National Party has urged the prime minister to reduce the Cabinet size and Golding has said he would oblige.

$424,830 a piece

It cost just over $5.5 million monthly to pay for 13 'ordinary' Cabinet ministers, who comes out as $424,830 a piece. Taxpayers also spend $3.7 million monthly to pay 10 state ministers whose monthly earnings, including benefits, amount to $371,726 per person.

Deputy Prime Minister Dr Ken Baugh pockets $495,56,5 and finance minister Audley Shaw carries home $458,817 monthly. The lowest-paid members of government are parliamentary secretaries Warren Newby and Aundré Franklin. They earn $318,623 per month.

The monthly saving from each government minister taking the 10 per cent salary cut has been $42,483; for each minister of state it is $37,172.70 and $26,551.92 for a government backbencher.

Meanwhile, The Sunday Gleaner's examination of the pay structure, provided by the Houses of Parliament, reveals that the monthly savings for one less minister would be $213,831, or $2,565,978 per year.

$1.89 million difference

The difference between the annual basic salary for a Cabinet minister and that of a regular member of parliament is $1.89 million.

Crawford has supported the Opposition's call for a reduction in Golding's Cabinet. He said that "cutting the size of government is merely the first step in developing a better, more efficient system of government".

"Ministries have been chopped up to give persons ministerial jobs. If you put these ministries back to where they belong and where there is a greater synergy, then a restructuring of the Cabinet would cause the country greater savings," Crawford argued.

But Samuda has said that reducing the size of the Cabinet cannot be seen as the panacea for Jamaica's problems.

"Unless you reduce agencies and reduce actual persons who are working (in the public sector), you are not going to effect that much of a change," Samuda said.

daraine.luton@gleanerjm.com