Let's turn this week to the mailbox. It's an opportune time, Mr. Editor, now that the House on the Hill is in recess. Inquiring readers wanted to know:

* What can be done to make Government ministers answer parliamentary questions?

The short answer is: very little, actually. House Rules do not provide any sanction for refusals to respond; and, as far as I know from my research, parliaments rarely do. Convention and practice has it that ministers are obliged to reply with an answer of some sort, at the very least, unless the Speaker decides otherwise. The Speaker is the person in charge of the Legislature and the final authority in these matters. If the Speaker rules any question out of order, because it infringes the rules which govern what questions can and cannot be asked, one of two things can happen. He may direct either that:

— the question be printed or asked "with such alterations as he may direct"; or that

— the MP who is asking, be informed that "the question is out of order".

Otherwise, ministers are expected to respond on the record with answers or their reasons for a refusal to answer. The Speaker can then decide and the public will know where their Governments stands, and it is the public who apply the ultimate sanction, through the ballot box. Or so the theory goes.

PS On my outstanding questions on the $800,000 Corporation consultants, I have not been told I am out of order or that the questions must be altered.

Not our finest hours

* Why can't you lot better organise the Budget Debate to give more backbenchers an opportunity to participate?

OK, enough already. I accept that these were not our finest hours, and haven't been for some tiresome years now. It can be organised better. But it isn't just that the rules need to be changed or should be changed. What is required is the political will to improve the way in which we conduct business on the Hill. Some suggestions were made last year prior to the Budget Debate. Opposition Leader Kim Swan wrote to the Premier seeking collaboration between the sides' two whips on three key issues: —

— The scheduling of what departments should be debated in the 42 allotted hours and the time each should be given;

— Agreement on how much time ministers and the shadow spokesmen should have to open departmental debates, including agreement on the time the Minister should have for a right of reply, and on how much each backbencher could have in the intervening time; and that

— Ministerial briefs be shared in advance only for the purposes of preparation for debate and not for publication.

The offer was flat-out rejected. How soon they forget Mr. Editor. But once bitten, twice shy, I guess. The offer was not extended again this year. Meanwhile, the only change contemplated in the revised rules is extension of the debate for a further two days which presumably will allow for more departments to be featured in the Budget debate in the House on the Hill. Whether it will lead to actual debate remains an open question. It ultimately depends on whether or not the Government is prepared to make debate possible. The reading of interminable briefs has got to go and in its place some of the suggestions which were advanced and spurned over a year ago. All that's needed is the will to make it happen.

What's full-time but more money

* How come you voted against making all Cabinet Ministers full-time? Aren't they?

Second question first: I don't know whether all Ministers are working full-time on nothing but Government business. I don't know, and you don't know, because they won't tell us. First question: I know, I know, there are those who think we voted against just for the purpose.

We are Opposition and this is what Oppositions are supposed to do: vote against. But the fact is that we didn't understand why in these times we were being asked to vote for an increase in salary, for one Cabinet Minister as it turned out, the Minister of Finance Paula Cox, who informed all of Bermuda that she wasn't going to accept the pay increase even if it was approved. It wasn't. It wasn't because we also didn't agree with the way in which this issue of full-time Cabinet Ministers is being addressed. Period.

You may recall that there is this legislative distinction of full-time and part-time Ministers. But what the legislation does not tell us is what makes a Minister full-time and not part-time, or vice versa, except that if a Cabinet Minister elects to be full-time take home pay doubles by $100,000 as compared with $50,000 for a so-called part-timer. The point has not been lost on the Salaries Review Board which adjudicates and makes recommendations on parliamentary salaries. This is what they had to say in their most recent report:

"It is not for this Board to enter into a debate as to whether the job of a Minister is, by its nature or in the circumstances of the particular case, a full-time or part-time occupation", they wrote. [It's a pity in my view that they didn't, an objective view might have been helpful.] "The fact", they went on, "that the Board has a duty to assign a recommended salary level to each category implies a legislative recognition of the potential for a Cabinet portfolio to be characterised as either full-time or part-time. We have assumed that it falls to the Premier of the day to make the determination in each case."

Not good enough, we think. There ought to be some definite clear criteria of what's required. As the Board also pointed out: "Since a full-time occupation is commonly understood to be one which takes up the whole of the working day, the question is begged as to whether it is open to a full-time Minister to continue to accept other employment — and, if so, the nature and extent of that employment". Exactly. In fact, Mr. Editor, I expect that the average person around here thinks that full-time would mean just that, full-time with no other outside commitments, which is a reasonable position to take now that full-time Ministers take home around $155,000 a year in salary along with lot of perks like a GP car, free gas, Blackberries, credit card expense accounts, and free travel. Say, did I leave anything out?

QUOTE FOR THIS WEEK

"Remember, if someone lies to you, they've done it before, and they will do it again" — Life's Little Instructions Calendar, March 2010.

Go ahead, make my mailbag, write jbarritt@ibl.bm.