Ms Diana McCaulay, the chief executive officer at the Jamaica Environment Trust (JET), summed up the Royalton building collapse perfectly. It is, she stated, “an example of what reckless disregard of regulation leads to”.

That, we hold, is the fundamental issue here, for had the country’s laws been observed and, most importantly, enforced, Tuesday morning’s tragic event at the construction site would likely not have occurred.

The JET shared with the public documents it received using the Access to Information Act, which showed that two inspections of the project were carried out on December 17, 2015 and January 29, 2016.

Reports from those inspections, JET said, revealed a significant level of non-compliance only two months into the life of the building permit. “Following a Warning Notice (#8822) issued on December 3, 2015, the permittee remained in breach, with a compliance level of only 34.5 per cent as at the monitoring visit on December 17, 2015. In January 2016, the compliance level decreased to 27.6 per cent,” JET said.

The environmental watchdog also told us that the December inspection found that the holder of the construction permit was in breach of 18 specific conditions of the 29 that were evaluated on that visit.

“Warning Notice #09552 was issued to the civil works manager, which addressed five breaches. There were six conditions that were addressed in Warning Notice #8822, previously issued, that were still in breach,” JET said.

The breaches, JET said further, had been reported both to and by the National Environment and Planning Agency (NEPA), the Natural Resources Conservation Authority (NRCA), the Hanover Parish Council, the Negril/Green Island Planning Authority the breaches had been reported both to and by the National Environment and Planning Agency, the Natural Resources Conservation Authority (NRCA), the Hanover Parish Council, the Negril/Green Island Planning Authority, and to the former and current political directorate.

The question these entities must now answer is, why did they ignore their responsibility to have the site shut down until the builders conformed with the law?

Other alleged breaches are now being reported by the Negril Chamber of Commerce, among them that construction on the hotel started long before the building plans were approved by NEPA and the NRCA. If that is true, the relevant officials in those agencies need to be held to account for failing to do their jobs.

We shudder to think what would happen had this tragedy occurred after the hotel was opened and occupied. Any such incident would have severely harmed Jamaica’s reputation as a vacation destination.

This incident has given the authorities an opportunity to correct all the ills affecting the system of building permits and the inspection of building projects. The people found guilty of neglect, or any transgression in this matter, including those in the political directorate, past and present, should also suffer the consequences of their action.

We should not allow this one to slip, because the next tragedy could end with more than five people being injured.