Over To You PM Holness , In Mombasa Grass Saga…

The fol­low­ing is the full text of the inau­gur­al address by Prime Minister Andrew Holness at his swear­ing-in cer­e­mo­ny on (March 3, 2016).
Your Excellencies, the Governor General, the Most Honourable Sir Patrick Allen and Lady Allen
Leader of the Opposition the Most Honorable Portia Simpson Miller
Former Prime Ministers:
The Most Honorable Edward Seaga and Mrs Seaga
The Most Honorable PJ Patterson
The Honorable Bruce Golding and Mrs Golding
My fel­low Jamaicans
Good afternoon.
I rec­og­nize that I stand here today only by the Grace of God. It has not been an easy jour­ney to this podi­um, but earnest labour and fer­vent prayers con­quer all. To God be the glory.
It is with a deep sense of grat­i­tude, hon­our and humil­i­ty that I took the Oath of Office moments ago, ful­ly con­scious of the mag­ni­tude of expec­ta­tions and respon­si­bil­i­ty I have assumed, but equal­ly ener­gized and opti­mistic about a pros­per­ous future for Jamaica. I pledge to serve the peo­ple of Jamaica faith­ful­ly, with all of my ener­gies, all of my heart, mind and soul.
I stand here today hap­py to be rep­re­sent­ing the voice, vision, vote and vic­to­ry of Jamaica.
We may have dif­fer­ent voic­es and dif­fer­ent votes on a sim­i­lar vision, regard­less of our dif­fer­ences, Jamaica was vic­to­ri­ous at the General Elections. It is not per­fect, but we can all be proud of the peo­ple, sys­tems and insti­tu­tions that make up our democracy.
Meaning of the Mandate
On the day of Election, I wit­nessed a young man car­ry­ing, cra­dled in his arm, an obvi­ous­ly bed-rid­den elder­ly man from a polling sta­tion. I was touched by the sight. In the bus­tle of the busy school yard, as they passed, the elder­ly man point­ed his ink stained fin­ger at me and said, “Andrew, do the right thing!”
I stand here hum­bled by the awe­some pow­er of you, the peo­ple, and I com­mit to doing right by you. The peo­ple are sov­er­eign and their views and votes must nev­er be tak­en for granted.
The peo­ple of Jamaica did not vote in vain. They expect a gov­ern­ment that works for them and by the same expec­ta­tion, an Opposition that is con­struc­tive. This his­toric elec­tion deliv­ered the small­est major­i­ty but also the clear­est man­date: Fix Government!
With this mandate:
There is no major­i­ty for arrogance.
There is no space for selfishness.
There is no place for pettiness.
There is no room for com­pla­cen­cy and,
There is no mar­gin for error.
I am under no illu­sion as to the mean­ing of this man­date. We have not won a prize. Instead, the peo­ple are giv­ing us a test.
There is no absolute agency of pow­er. This means that the win­ner can­not take all, or believe we can do it alone.
Leading Partnerships for Prosperity
To achieve the vision of shared pros­per­i­ty through inclu­sive eco­nom­ic growth and mean­ing­ful job cre­ation, now more than ever, Government must lead, acti­vate, empow­er and build real part­ner­ships. I intend to lead a Government of part­ner­ship. The solu­tions to our prob­lems do not rest with Government alone.
The sum total of our poten­tial exceeds our prob­lems; our col­lec­tive capa­bil­i­ties are greater than our chal­lenges, but it is only through part­ner­ship that these capa­bil­i­ties and this poten­tial can be seized, har­nessed and real­ized for the good of Jamaica.
Partnerships require trust, clear assign­ment of respon­si­bil­i­ty and an ele­vat­ed sense of duty.
There is only so much trust that pledges and state­ments of com­mit­ment can buy. I under­stand that the Jamaican peo­ple now want to see action in build­ing trust. This is part of fix­ing government.
Everyone who will form the next gov­ern­ment must be seized of this expectation.
From the politi­cian mak­ing pol­i­cy to the civ­il ser­vant pro­cess­ing an appli­ca­tion, we must act duti­ful­ly to ful­fill our responsibilities.
Trust requires the actu­al­iza­tion of our com­mit­ments. We will ful­fill our commitments.
Our actions can achieve so much more if they are coör­di­nat­ed. We will bring greater coör­di­na­tion, ratio­nal­i­ty and focus to the role of gov­ern­ment so that the objec­tives of part­ner­ship can be clear.
There is no doubt that sig­nif­i­cant num­bers of Jamaicans have lost hope in our sys­tem, but I am encour­aged that a far larg­er num­ber main­tains faith, keeps hope and con­tin­ues to pray that Jamaica will grow and prosper.
I am ener­gized by the expres­sions of will­ing­ness to work with our new Government in the inter­est of Jamaica. The sense of duty is alive and well. There is more hope than despair and this cre­ates a great oppor­tu­ni­ty to form part­ner­ships for prosperity.
Partnership with Families
You know, I am now joined in Parliament by my life part­ner Juliet. Family is the ulti­mate part­ner­ship. And that is why my Government will focus resources on sup­port­ing families.
By increas­ing the income tax thresh­old we will restore the eco­nom­ic pow­er of house­holds to par­tic­i­pate in not only grow­ing our GDP but more impor­tant­ly grow­ing the gen­er­al well­be­ing of the society.
Here’s how the part­ner­ship with fam­i­lies, and the work­ing heads of house­holds will work.
Our gov­ern­ment will ease your tax bur­den, but you must spend and invest wise­ly, use the addi­tion­al mon­ey to acquire a house for your fam­i­ly or improve the house you already have, or buy Jamaican-made goods.
This how we will increase local effec­tive demand in hous­ing, man­u­fac­tur­ing, and agri­cul­ture. This is how you can play a part in cre­at­ing in jobs while sat­is­fy­ing your well-being.
We will con­tin­ue our pol­i­cy of tuition-free edu­ca­tion and no user fee access to health care. However, will enable you to save in an edu­ca­tion bond for your chil­dren’s edu­ca­tion and in a nation­al health insur­ance scheme your healthcare.
We will enhance our social safe­ty net for vul­ner­a­ble fam­i­lies, and will pro­vide sup­port for par­ents in cri­sis, but you must be respon­si­ble and send your chil­dren to school. Our men must take care of their chil­dren, and cou­ples must be respon­si­ble in hav­ing the chil­dren they can afford.
Our gov­ern­ment com­mits to cre­at­ing the envi­ron­ment in which fam­i­lies can flour­ish and form com­mu­ni­ties of social mobil­i­ty from which every ghet­to youth can be star. However, every fam­i­ly mem­ber must do his or her part by being per­son­al­ly, social­ly and eco­nom­i­cal­ly responsible.
I am sure Juliet will under­stand if I seek to build anoth­er part­ner­ship in Parliament. Leader of the Opposition, Portia Simpson Miller has giv­en long and ded­i­cat­ed ser­vice to the coun­try and I believe the man­date is say­ing, we may not be on the same side of the road, but as much as pos­si­ble we should hold hands in coöper­a­tion to over­come obsta­cles for the good of the country.
We have evolved with­out for­mal struc­ture a very good part­ner­ship in edu­ca­tion and we intend to con­tin­ue our infor­mal col­lab­o­ra­tions in this area and pur­sue oth­er such areas of coöper­a­tion between Government and Opposition members.
I still believe it is a use­ful sym­bol of nation­al uni­ty for the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition to appear togeth­er in zones of polit­i­cal exclu­sions. I again extend the invitation.
Partnership for Growth with Private Sector
The pri­or­i­ty of this Government is to grow the econ­o­my and cre­ate mean­ing­ful jobs. In so doing, we will more rapid­ly and sus­tain­ably reduce debt. I am sure we all agree that much of Jamaica’s devel­op­ment has been achieved with­out growth, which has left us with much debt. This is unsustainable.
Going for­ward, Jamaica’s devel­op­ment must rest on its abil­i­ty to cre­ate propo­si­tions of val­ue and attract invest­ments to con­vert the val­ue into wealth. In this mod­el, Government is not the main investor, it is the Private Sector whether they be large enter­pris­es or small busi­ness. In the eco­nom­ic part­ner­ship with the Private Sector, Government’s role, among oth­ers, is:
To ensure the rule of law.
Create a safe, secure, and fair envi­ron­ment for business
Make mar­kets where none exist
Ensure trans­paren­cy and access to infor­ma­tion ‑and cre­ate an effi­cient and sup­port­ive pub­lic sec­tor bureaucracy
In exchange, we want the Private Sector to unleash invest­ments in the local econ­o­my. We want to see the return of the pio­neer­ing dri­ve to cre­ate new indus­tries, the entre­pre­neur­ial will­ing­ness to take risk, and the inno­v­a­tive insight to do things bet­ter. I am heart­ened by the sig­nals com­ing from the Private Sector. I believe they have got the mes­sage about the part­ner­ship for growth and job cre­ation. Now is the time for growth.
Partnership with inter­na­tion­al partners
We are not naïve about the chal­lenges we face regard­ing our debt and the need to main­tain fis­cal dis­ci­pline. This is why we will con­tin­ue with the prin­ci­ple of joint over­sight of our Economic Programme and performance.
We rec­og­nize the impor­tance of, and val­ue our rela­tion­ship with our bilat­er­al and mul­ti­lat­er­al friends. These rela­tion­ships have been crit­i­cal in secur­ing sta­bil­i­ty. We believe in pre­serv­ing sta­bil­i­ty, but we must now build up on this in a pro­duc­tive part­ner­ships with them to achieve inclu­sive growth and job creation.
There are many more areas of part­ner­ships that we must for­mal­ly pur­sue for nation­al devel­op­ment and as our gov­ern­ment is installed over the com­ing days these will become evident.
The Role of the Prime Minister
In all these part­ner­ships for pros­per­i­ty, there must be coör­di­nat­ed effort. That is my role. I will ensure that:
Government is coör­di­nat­ed and strate­gi­cal­ly directed.
Decisions are tak­en quickly.
Targets are set.
The nation is informed and that.
Everyone under my appoint­ment is held to account for their action or lack thereof.
Institutional Reform
There is a sense of expec­ta­tion of change. It is not lost on me that I am the first of the Post-Independence gen­er­a­tion to lead Jamaica. More than any­thing else we want to see Jamaica take its true place as a devel­oped coun­try in the next 50 years. The strug­gle is not so much polit­i­cal inde­pen­dence as it is eco­nom­ic inde­pen­dence. It is through our eco­nom­ic inde­pen­dence that we secure real polit­i­cal independence.
However, after 53 years of inde­pen­dence, there is need for insti­tu­tion­al review of the Jamaican State both in terms of mod­ern­iza­tion of the insti­tu­tions of the State, and the struc­ture of the State. Government has to improve its busi­ness process­es and become more effi­cient as a reg­u­la­tor and a ser­vice provider.
There is need for us to have a say in the fun­da­men­tal insti­tu­tions that define Jamaica, the rights we secure for our cit­i­zens and how we want Jamaica to be. We will give form to that voice in a ref­er­en­dum to decide on the con­sti­tu­tion­al mat­ters and social matters.
Independent Jamaica must remove the cul­ture of depen­den­cy from our midst. We must teach our chil­dren that there is no wealth with­out work, and no suc­cess with­out sac­ri­fice. We must remove the belief from the psy­che of our chil­dren that the only way they can step up in life is not by how hard they work, but by who they know.
As Prime Minister I have a duty to align our incen­tives and reward sys­tems for those who work and fol­low rules. We must cre­ate a Jamaica where the man who plays by the rules is rewarded!
It is impor­tant that the cit­i­zens of Independent Jamaica have a sense of enti­tle­ment to good ser­vice from their coun­try. However, increas­ing­ly this is not being bal­anced with a duty of ‘giv­ing back’. Jamaica has ben­e­fit­ed sig­nif­i­cant­ly from the civic pride and sense of nation­hood that drove so many to give gen­er­ous­ly of their tal­ent and trea­sures to build our great nation.
The spir­it still exists, to a great extent, local­ly and in our Diaspora. However, we have to be more active in pro­mot­ing civic respon­si­bil­i­ty, vol­un­teerism and ‘giv­ing back’, par­tic­u­lar­ly among our youth. And we have to inte­grate the incred­i­ble tal­ents and assets of the Jamaican Diaspora in local devel­op­ment. Too often I hear com­plaints from the Diaspora that they expe­ri­ence dif­fi­cul­ty in giv­ing to Jamaica. Giving should be easy, as part of our Partnership for Prosperity which includes the Diaspora, we will make it eas­i­er for you to con­tribute to the devel­op­ment of your homeland.
Jamaica is too rich in peo­ple and tal­ent to be a poor coun­try. With good gov­er­nance and a prospec­tive out­look, Jamaica, with­in a decade or less, could emerge as a boom­ing econ­o­my and a pros­per­ous society.
Jamaica is geo­graph­i­cal­ly cen­tral in the Caribbean. My vision is to turn Jamaica into the cen­tre of the Caribbean. A cen­tre of finance, trade and com­merce, tech­nol­o­gy and inno­va­tion, and the cen­tre of arts, cul­ture, and lifestyle region­al­ly. This is all pos­si­ble with­in our life­time. Despite any neg­a­tives, Jamaica still has a pow­er­ful and allur­ing brand ampli­fy­ing our voice and influ­ence in the world.
We can­not be sat­is­fied with things as they are. My dream is to ful­fill your dream. We must cre­ate a Jamaica where there is hope and oppor­tu­ni­ty. Where we can encour­age our chil­dren to dream big and be opti­mistic about their life chances. We must cre­ate a Jamaica where our young peo­ple can find mean­ing­ful work. A Jamaica where you feel safe to live, work and raise your chil­dren. A Jamaica that is boom­ing and investors and entre­pre­neurs can have a con­fi­dent out­look on the econ­o­my. A place where we can retire and tru­ly enjoy as paradise.
All of this is pos­si­ble. We must start now. Time for a part­ner­ship. Time for action!

NOW THIS /​

Samuda pays for his Mombasa grass.

MINISTER of Industry, Commerce, Agriculture and Fisheries Karl Samuda informed the House of Representatives yes­ter­day that he has now paid up $546,000 for the Mombasa grass plant­ed on his prop­er­ty in Knollis, St Catherine, by the Jamaica Dairy Development Board (JDDB).Samuda also told the House that he has the names of oth­er major farms, some polit­i­cal­ly linked, which have also ben­e­fit­ed from the 500 acres of the grass already plant­ed across the coun­try to boost dairy production.

However, he said he cur­rent­ly has no inten­tion of releas­ing those names.

“Similar treat­ment was offered and avail­able to all diary, beef and small rumi­nants farm­ers,” Samuda told the House, in an impromp­tu response to the alle­ga­tions made by Opposition spokesman on agri­cul­ture Dr Dayton Campbell in Parliament last week Wednesday.

Samuda said that, unlike claims made by the Opposition People’s National Party (PNP), the project was not restrict­ed to small farm­ers and many of the major farms had received “a con­sid­er­ably larg­er con­tri­bu­tion” of grass than he had, and were not required to pay for the service.

“I do not wish to name them now, and I will not. The fact of the mat­ter is that per­sons who have par­tic­i­pat­ed in this pro­gramme were not only relat­ed to non-polit­i­cal fig­ures. But I have no inten­tion what­so­ev­er to match like with like,” he said.

“I would not seek to strength­en my pre­sen­ta­tion by draw­ing ref­er­ence to any­one that it might even­tu­al­ly hurt, because I am sat­is­fied that any­one who took advan­tage of this pro­gramme did so in the earnest belief that it would improve their con­tri­bu­tion to the devel­op­ment of the coun­try through agri­cul­ture,” he added.