Behind the drama being played out in front of Cabinet Office this week looms a stark reality — that if the Bermuda Government does not soon start spending much less and/or earning much more, it is only a matter of time before fiscal collapse.While politics can offer solutions, they can also inflame emotions and cause us all to lose sight of the problem to be addressed. It's a matter of mathematics, not politics.The gross debt stands at $2.185 billion — that's the equivalent of about the next two years and four months of government revenue, based on projections for the 2015-16 fiscal year.The Government is expecting to spend $267 million more than it takes in for the year ending March 31, 2015 and another $200 million-or-so deficit is expected for next year.That means Bermuda is still only applying the brakes as it careers down the hill to further indebtedness. There is much to do before it can make the U-turn and head back up the hill towards fiscal surplus.But the clock is ticking. As the debt has grown, so have the costs of servicing it.The combination of interest payments and contributions to the Sinking Fund — the vehicle used to set aside money for paying off long-term debt principal — will cost about $166 million in the next fiscal year, or about 17 cents of every dollar that the Government takes in.The debt beast is likely to feed even more voraciously on taxpayer dollars in years to come. Investors on the international capital markets who financially prop up the Bermuda Government today will want their principal back. The daunting repayment schedule reads thus: $90 million in 2016, $180 million in 2019, $500 million in 2020, $140 million in 2022, $475 million in 2023 and $800 million in 2024.Those funds have been borrowed at an average interest rate of about 5 per cent, but when Bermuda comes to roll over each swathe of debt, it is likely that bond investors will demand a higher return on the risk that they are taking, given the worsening fiscal situation. The rating agencies who grade Bermuda bonds will frown upon any failure to meet stated targets, such as reducing the deficit to $120 million (less than half this year's shortfall) by 2016-17, and our credit rating would suffer as a result, meaning higher interest payments.Put bluntly, this is a time for a pragmatic search for solutions. Large-scale revenue growth is an unlikely immediate answer, given that the economy has been shrinking in real terms for five years, not helped by a declining population. So the solution will inevitably involve painful cuts.Long gone are the times when Bermuda could afford to put its head in the sand and pretend the public sector can go on living beyond its means for another year or two, and to let someone else deal with the tough decisions later. A dose of short-term pain now could lead to long-term stability. Otherwise, the day will come when the chance to rectify the situation will be out of Bermudian hands and the terms will be dictated by our rescuers, whether they are from the British Government or the International Monetary Fund.Maybe we could take a leaf out of Jamaica's book, itself the subject of an IMF emergency loan. For so long a byword for fiscal disaster, the Caribbean island has trimmed down its public sector to a size that the country can afford and is now running a budget surplus of 7 per cent. Government, opposition and unions have realised that they need to be constructive and work together to ensure that the demands of the IMF programme continue to be met.Their pragmatism came after years of economic misery. Bermuda still has the time to take the necessary steps in time to avoid a similar scenario.