The Board Chill phenomenon- My column- 28June 2011

There are too many state enterprises. The Government must revisit the raison d'etre of state companies. We do not need separate entities for seafood development, film and entertainment; and separate rural, urban and community development companies, PSAEL and so on.

Second, in needing to bring the best talent on boards, civil lawsuits against former boards may unwittingly create a new problem. It is "board chill'' — a reluctance by otherwise qualified persons to serve on boards, fearing that the worst could come out of a change in Government. The state is entitled to hold directors accountable, now or in the future. But no one wants to be hunted and with little to gain and lots to lose, talented individuals may avoid the unnecessary headache of a state board appointment.

Good governance:Fixing State Corporations- Part 2- My column 18 October 2010

Fundamental to the Government's rebooting of the governance rules in the State sector is the rationalization of the sector. The idea of these State companies was that certain policy objectives of the Government could best be achieved in a corporate environment, away from some restraints of legislation, Parliament and politics.

The recent PNM opted for an expansion of the model in which limited liability companies, wholly owned by the State, provided goods and services to the public. With these State companies, procurement through the Central Tenders Board is avoided and internal tender rules apply. Variations in compensation suggest that salary decisions are subjective. Allowances and terms and conditions follow suit, lacking homogeneity across the State sector.In that context a renegade State sector has evolved and Parliament and Cabinet do not provide the major public policy thrust for the sector. There are two operating models and in one, the inner Cabinet defines an end result and gives it to the most malleable State company to execute, without regard to core function.

Good governance: Fixing State Corporations- My column 11 October 2010

The only question is which of the State entities and their boards will, 24 months from today, be the headline acts for all the wrong reasons. Since UDeCOTT and the Uff Commission nothing has assured the public that the familiar path of shady dealings will not be trodden.It is a waste of sensible people's time to debate the suitability of choices for boards and related State appointments. Competence, qualification, experience and ethnicity have not been decisive factors in predicting whether boards will be diligent or will land in trouble. UDeCOTT itself demonstrates that these are largely irrelevant: bad behaviour is not that selective.

There are theories on gender and the lower likelihood of women being corrupt. Patrick Manning did a better job at promoting women than any other leader but, in 2010, "chairman" is still given literal meaning. The seat at the top of the table is masculine, until further notice.

Harvard Business Review- Special Report- July/August 2011

Update on Canadian banking regulation- 2011

The principal governmental and regulatory policies that govern the Canadian Banking sector.

Going after the corrupt:Civil War?- My column 21st June 2011

The Integrity Commission has become a bystander, a fact unsurprising in light of some body-blows the Commission has suffered: a dress-down by the Court in the Rowley matter; resignation of the Commissioners ex-post facto; and the short-lived replacement of those Commissioners, a prelude to the most amazing meltdown of a Commission of any sort. More recent events have added to the blight that appears to have settled upon a much vaunted body, which in better times might be the ones pursuing the former State board members the AG is attempting to rattle with civil suits. More importantly, a working Integrity Commission may save the next party in power the expense of pursuing current persons-of-power.

A better Corporation Sole will also save some money. The redesign of the State-enterprise model is left in limbo, in the backward movement to search for corruption and the forward movement to court. But more attention has to be directed towards cleaning the stables and bolting the doors, as an alternative to chasing the horses. That quaint office of the Corporation Sole is central in many of the love-hate issues between the public and its State enterprises.

In Jack Warner's World- My column 7th June 2011

Different strokes for different folks. That is one way to explain Jack Warner's continued stay in Cabinet. But it is not that simple: Warner has many irons in the UNC fire and the party treads carefully. The big troubles are however higher up the pecking order and FIFA, like global governments and organisations, is now beset by intolerance for the leader-for-life mentality and what goes with it.

 

Pouncing upon every issue is a noisy, no-nonsense internet crowd, resistant to these attitudes of entitlement and this crowd can shake FIFA down. In the midst of this, it is troubling that the AG has fashioned his own rule of law in answer to the Warner/FIFA issue and others. In any event, with all these irons in the UNC fire, do you really expect the AG and the PM to say that Warner should step aside?

The Challenge Parents Face- My column 14 June 2011

Life is about reward, recognition and penalty and parents have no need to deviate from that. Children feel entitled to the best things in life without the effort. We reward good and bad equally and encourage fleeting mediocrity and a whole lot of crap which one day ends piled on some other schoolchild in a drain. Do our children know what we expect from them? Will we tell them, demand it and reward or penalise? Or are we more interested in being popular in our homes and in their lives?

Even if parents are tough, too many parents are inconsistent. We remember school when the school report comes along; make an evening of noise and move on to the next thing. Children are quick to take advantage of our distraction, when we take our eyes off the gauge. Children sense disagreements and then take advantage of the good cop, bad cop routine.


Parents have to work in tandem, plotting the responses, scripting the stories and enforcing the expectations. If parents are to help children make good decisions they have to be experts on what is happening in their children's lives. Before that they have to be in charge of their own lives.

Eating in and around Seattle- New York Times

Frank Bruni, the US foodie says in this NYT piece "I’m hard-pressed to think of another corner or patch of the United States where the locavore sensibilities of the moment are on such florid (and often sweetly funny) display, or where they pay richer dividends, at least if you’re a lover of fish. You could, I guess, make a case for the southern stretch of the Pacific Northwest around Portland, Ore., a city honored by its own cable television show, “Portlandia,” which pokes fun at its artisanal obsessions, epicurean and otherwise. But Portland isn’t as connected to and intimate with the sea and tides as Seattle. It’s not as wondrously watery.In greater Seattle and the San Juan Islands you get a lineup and caliber of local oysters that aren’t easily matched, in addition to superb spot prawns, salmon, black cod and halibut."