It is back to the polls in eighteenth months or so. And the political temperature is slowly rising. The Honourable Hubert Hughes’ Anguilla United Movement is on the move with public meetings across the island. They are chaired by Felix Fleming who tells listeners that Hubert “takes a licking, but for the people he keeps on kicking!”

As the temperature rises, I am beginning to feel that no matter which party wins the next election it will make little difference to the quality of our governance under the Westminster system of government we inherited from the “mother country”. Under this system, born and bred in the UK and for the UK, executive power resides in the prime minister and his cabinet and legislative power in the legislature (parliament). All ministers of government must be members of the legislature. While the prime minister is the single most powerful individual in the system, it (the system) provides several checks and balances which ensure effective, responsible and accountable government.
In the UK the Westminster system of government works like a Rolls Royce. In the Anglophone Caribbean (including Anguilla) it works like an old truck running downhill with no brakes, a faulty exhaust, no headlights and so on. I am making the point the Westminster system of government as practised in our region is one which does not allow for responsible, transparent and accountable government. It is one where the executive is out of control and unchecked. It is one in which the executive controls the legislature – in which the legislature is a tool of the executive. It is one that breeds dictatorship.

The system’s workings in the Caribbean has brought us to the realisation that we imported its bare bones– the skeleton – without the vital organs and the operating principles essential to its proper functioning. To highlight its shortcoming, I will compare briefly the relationship between the Executive and Legislature (Parliament) in the UK with the relationship between the Executive and the Legislature in the Caribbean, with references to Anguilla as necessary. Then I will show that while there are effective checks on the powers of the prime minister in the UK, such checks are virtually non-existent on prime ministers and chief ministers in the Caribbean.
Firstly, the working relationship between the Executive (whose principal function is the direction of a country’s administration) and the Legislature. The Legislature’s functions include examining proposals for new laws, approving the raising of revenue for running the country, scrutinising government’s policies and administration, debating the major issues of the day and checking the powers of the executive.
How do the two bodies work together? Lawmaking. In the UK, the Executive determines its legislative agenda and presents draft laws to Parliament for debate and approval. Even though the Government has a majority there is no guarantee that the legislation will be passed without amendment. In Anguilla, the Executive Council presents draft legislation to the House knowing full well that it will be passed. Unlike in the UK, the Opposition counter-proposals, no matter how genuine, are most times ignored and there are hardly any amendments with the exception of dotting an “i” here and crossing a “t” there. And this is nothing new. This has been the case with government after government. I don’t blame them. That is the way the political system operates.
Incidentally, laws could be passed in our House with only two members (plus the Speaker) present. All that is needed is a proposer and a seconder and if there is no one to indicate to the Speaker that there is no a quorum the “ayes” have it.
Approval of revenue (the Budget). In the UK this is serious business. And the government takes into consideration the views of its backbenchers and the Opposition. In Anguilla the budget will be passed with hardly any thought to the opposite view.
Scrutiny of government’s policies and administration. In the UK the various Standing Committees and Select Committees keep the Executive on its toes. They have wide powers of scrutiny and investigation. Anguilla has no such committees except for a Public Accounts Committee which has never functioned. But any attempt by the Opposition to question government’s action or policies is met with rebuke. Governments in Anguilla do not think that they are accountable to the House of Assembly for which they have little regard or respect.
Another observation. In Anguilla, the Executive does not consider itself collectively responsible for anything. Neither do its members consider themselves individually responsible for their actions. They do not give a damn. Take for example the loss of the lucrative transshipment business in the late 1990s. In the UK some minister, or ministers, would have resigned or would have been sacked. But not in Anguilla. It is business as usual.
Debate on major issues. This is a foremost aspect of work of the UK Parliament. In Anguilla the House only meets when Government wants to rubber stamp some tax or similar measures. Major issues, except for the Annual Budget, are seldom debated. I recall Government bringing the Golf Course Project to the House for debate, some months ago, but withdrew it and never brought it back. End of matter. Our House is not in the habit of debating major national issues.
I must add, though, that the quality of the few debates that do take place leaves a lot to be desired. The resulting stench desecrates the House. If you want to hear who horning who, or who got outside children, listen to the House. And no matter how much Rev Lloyd, its chaplain, prays at the opening of its meetings it makes no difference. These days his prayers are getting longer and longer, all to no avail.
It is the popular view that our House of Assembly does not perform the functions of a legislature and is an institution which we could do without. It is irrelevant. If it is not reformed as a consequence of the constitutional and electoral reform exercise now under way then we might as well use the building as a home for delinquent children.
I now come to comparing checks on the power of the prime minister of the UK with those on the power of the prime minister or chief minister in the Caribbean. It is in the prime minister, under the Westminster system of government, that we see the highest concentration of political power and authority. What are the checks on the power of the UK prime minister? They include, but are not limited to, the constitution, the vote of no confidence, the need to maintain the support of senior colleagues in government, the ability of backbenchers to vote independently of the Executive, public opinion and the news media. Those checks, it is well known, are extremely effective.
How effective are they on Caribbean prime ministers and chief ministers? In my view one of the few effective checks on Caribbean political leaders is the constitution. They are aware that the courts will not countenance breaches of its provisions. However, when it comes to statute law our leaders are ready to break it if it stands in their way. To quote Hubert Hughes (1994), “Governments make law and governments break law.”
Vote of no confidence. Does the threat of its use check the Prime Minister? No way. Apart from the removal of Ronald Webster’s Government in 1977, I am not aware of the removal of any government in the Anglophone Caribbean by way of a vote of no confidence. The members of government are too dependent on the Prime Minister for their political survival and dare not support such a vote.
The need for the prime minister or chief minister to maintain the support of his senior colleagues in government. This is another of the few checks that work. It has worked here. In 1977 Ronald Webster refused to listen to his senior partners and his government collapsed. Then in 1999 Hubert refused to listen to his and his government fell.
The backbenchers. Are they effective checks on our prime ministers? Far from it! They are nothing more than seat-warmers and prime ministers don’t give two kicks about them. Backbenchers in the Caribbean follow the prime minister, who is usually the party leader, blindly. They owe their political careers to him and therefore have no choice but to follow blindly.
Where backbenchers have the capacity to challenge their prime minister he neutralises them by offering them ministerial positions or some job of similar status. Now, look at how different things are in the UK. I quote from BBC on line (14th September 2003): “The Sunday Telegraph says Tony Blair has been warned that he risks a humiliating defeat in the House of Commons at the hands of Labour backbenchers, if he sticks to his proposal to allow universities to increase their tuition fees by as much as Ł3,000 per student.”
In Anguilla, we have no backbenchers so we are without the semblance of such a check. This has been so for many years. There are four ministerial posts. They are filled by the four ruling party members who win their seats. I know there has been talk about a fifth minister. Not that the workload of our ministers demands it. Far from that! Instead, it is simply to provide for another minister in the event that the winning party has a five to two seat majority in the House. So it appears that we will not have any backbenchers for years to come.
As regards public opinion being a check on Caribbean prime ministers, it is not a very effective one. It is often ignored except at election time. And don’t even mention public opinion in Anguilla. No matter how strongly people feel about an issue they may as well keep their mouths shut because it makes no difference to government’s actions or policies. Neither is the media a check. Our governments see it as an enemy and treat it like one. They fail to appreciate in the words of one writer that, “ It’s not the job of the media to manage the public images of MPs.”
In view of the foregoing, I am in a position to conclude that the Westminster system of government is unsuited for the peculiar circumstances of the Caribbean. It is a transplant from the UK and is unable to blossom in a region with a vastly different political culture and social and economic framework. And further, it is not supported by a consensus of values and attitudes and by conventions to make it effective.
I am also in a position to postulate that if we want responsible, accountable, responsive and transparent government we cannot get it under the Westminster system of government. Here in the Caribbean, it puts too much power in the hands of the Executive without a system of effective checks. It therefore creates elective dictatorships. Actually, during the political impasse here in 1999 the Honourable Victor Banks accused Hubert Hughes of Yeltsin-style leadership but Hubert holds the position (1998) that “dictatorship can be good if it is humane dictatorship.”

My own view is that dictatorship in any form has no place in a free society and I pray that Victor would begin to honour his pledge (1994): “There will be no new Bradshaws, no new dictators, no new autocrats [in Anguilla].” Towards that end, he is obliged to support the fundamental reform of our political system because so long as the Executive comes out of the Legislature, so long as our ministers of government are also members of the House of Assembly, we will continue to produce little dictators: Papa Docs and Baby Docs.
The practice of politics in Anguilla suggests that there is an overwhelmingly strong case for having the Executive separate from the Legislature – for having two separate and distinct bodies – each with its own designated powers. There is a strong case for our constitution to provide for separation of powers so that no person could serve in more than one branch of government at the same time – so that no politician could be a member of the Executive and of the House of Assembly at the same. He could be in either one or the other but not both.

Frankly speaking, politicians are not God and therefore there is no reason why they should be everywhere at the same time. In our situation, it is unsafe for the six men involved in the making of laws in the Executive Council to then go in the House of Assembly and approve those said laws. That cannot be democracy.

The apportionment of power and authority between the Executive and the House should be such that each has the capacity to check and control the other. A system of checks and balances is critical to good governance.
The adoption of the type of governmental system that is being advocated here calls for separate elections: elections for members of the Executive separate from elections for the House. Whether these should be island-wide or otherwise is a matter for debate. Right now I am only concerned with the separation of the executive and legislative branches of government.

Of course it has its disadvantages. I will not go into them here because I already did so in two presentations on electoral reform at the forums organised by the Constitutional and Electoral Reform Committee. (These were broadcast live and later carried by this newspaper.) But I will stress that its advantages outweigh those of our present governmental system by far. It provides for more accountable government and less despotic leadership.
Encouragingly, support for a system of government in which the principle of separation of powers is paramount, as well as for island-wide elections, is growing rapidly. Demand for fundamental change is increasing. It is being voiced at the village-to-village meetings now being held by the Constitutional and Electoral Reform Committee.
Surely, there will be some members of government who may not benefit from the proposed changes and are likely to oppose them. And this reminds me of something which Hubert has been saying repeatedly in the House of Assembly in recent times. He has been saying that there are people in government who would never plant a mango tree if they feel that they would not be able to eat some of its fruits. I trust that ministers would prove him wrong by supporting the constitutional changes emanating from the people.

It should never be office first, country later. Plant a mango tree.

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