THE need for a supplementary budget by a government arises from the need to recalibrate public finances after the midpoint of the fiscal year. Such action is merely financial prudence and nearly all governments have some such exercises and so do private enterprises.

A supplementary budget is business as usual and should not be an occasion for major expenditure cuts or massive tax packages. If either of these occurs, then it is either a sign of poor management by the Ministry of Finance — which could retard economic growth — or an indication of extraordinary circumstances, such as the massive public sector wage payment.

The economy of Jamaica has failed to produce real economic growth during the last 25 years, because of an unfortunate combination of both external factors and domestic events.

Successive governments of both political parties have tended to blame the pathetic growth performance on adverse external developments. For example, the shock of exponential spurs in oil prices has been a recurring factor from the first oil crisis in the mid-1970s. Yet, we have done very little to utilise alternative sources of energy, such as solar, wind and hydro.

The truth that Jamaicans do not like to face is that internal factors have been a major cause of the country’s economic malaise. These are self-inflicted wounds which we refuse to admit is entirely our fault.

The public sector is the principal offender in this regard, but so is an internationally uncompetitive private sector. The common factor over the last 25 years has been poor fiscal management leading to a debt burden that is a “ball and chain” holding back economic growth.

Economic growth requires a sequence of three components: ideas, policy and implementation.

Ideas are what ignite the process of initiating new private sector investments or new government policies. Ideas also lead to improvement in existing economic activity and in public policy. Jamaica generates or adopts plenty of ideas both feasible and impractical, particularly in the area of entrepreneurism, which are endemic to Jamaicans. There is no shortage of ideas, but the problem is that so many good ideas do not make it into private execution or into public policy.

Some ideas do become economic policy but they do not come to fruition because they are not implemented or are only partially implemented or their implementation is so delayed that they are no longer affordable or fecund.

The problem with growth here is not because of a lack of ideas or failure of Cabinet to mandate sound, innovative public policy, but rather because of inadequate and incompetent implementation by both the public sector and the private sector.

The Supplementary Budget is symptomatic of the dilemma of implementation. To substantiate our point: non-implementation by the public sector eg tax reform; incomplete implementation eg reducing the size (reform) of the public sector and delayed implementation resulting in cost escalation eg road and highway construction. Private sector examples: non-implementation eg rationalisation of electricity billing; incomplete implementation eg investment in productive activity once interest rates were lower, and delayed implementation causing cost escalation eg nearly every construction project.