A CLASSICAL DISTINCTION THAT STILL HOLDS TRUE TODAY

September 10, 2015 | By KNews | Filed Under Features / Columnists, Peeping Tom, Source

There is an urgent need for the Granger-administration to sit down and clarify for its members the exact role of Minister of the government. It does seem as if there is some confusion which does more than just blur the divisions between policy-making and implementation.

The role of a Minister of the government is to make and communicate policy. It is the role of the Permanent Secretary to ensure that this policy is implemented and monitored. The implementation of a policy is not the remit of a Minister and should never be entertained.

A Minister of the government cannot be involved in day- to- day line functions of a Ministry. This is not the proper role of the Minister who is restricted to policy making and communicating policy. When it comes to implementing that policy, this is done by line officers, and not by Ministers.

A Minister has ministerial responsibility for his or her ministry. This simply means that the Minister is required to answer questions in the National Assembly about the work of the ministry. It does not mean that the Minister is personally answerable for actions of line staff. If this were the case, then if a worker did something crazy on the job, the Minister would have to be held personally responsible.

The Minister would be forced to resign. This is not what ministerial responsibility is about. Ministerial responsibility is merely about answering questions in the parliament about the work of his or her ministry.

If therefore a minister performs a line function, then the failure of that function would entail the Minister being held responsible for the failure because in this instance the Minister is not making policy but is implementing policy.

For this reason Ministers should not be going on raids or visiting businesses during an exercise conducted by labour officers. These are line functions and when they are being performed, the Minister should not be part of these functions.

There is another important related reason for this principle. The line function is supposed to be carried out by line officers. But in the presence of their Minister, those line officers may defer to the opinion of the Minister rather than do what their technical knowledge predisposes them to do.

Thus if someone is in the presence of their boss and the boss says this is X, the person may be disinclined to say it is Y. Who wants to go against the boss? Ministers therefore should not get involved in operations carried out by line officers. They should set the policy, communicate the policy and allow the line officers to implement the policy.

It is very important that this distinction between policy-making and policy implementation be upheld. Unless this happens, professionalism is going to be undermined. The technical and line officers should each be allowed to do their work as an implementer. The Minister should do his or her work as a policy-maker.

For example, the Ministry of Home Affairs has a policy of a gun amnesty. But it is not for the Minister of Home Affairs to go around collecting the guns. That is the function of the line officers involved. Similarly if labour officers are conducting inspections, the relevant Minister should not be involved in this operation even as a spectator.

The government is new and it is enthusiastic about getting things done. But everyone needs to stick to their role and allow for a distinction between policy- making and policy-implementation.