Seaga and Manley
ON MAY 9, 1972, three months into the life of the new People's National Party Government, Prime Minister Michael Manley addressed Parliament, announcing the Government's decision to abolish the National Lottery.
The Government, he said, was convinced that one of the most important objectives to be pursued in the development of the country was "the fostering of the spirit of self-reliance".
The administration was equally convinced that "activities which hold out the prospects of gain without effort tend to frustrate the process by which this spirit of self-reliance can be developed," he asserted.
And even as he conceded that the principle of freedom gave each private individual the right "to use his leisure and dispose of his possessions as he pleases consistent with the Law", Prime Minister Manley argued that it was not appropriate for the Government to promote activities "which are themselves destructive of the spirit of self-reliance".
Above all, he asserted that the Lottery was not an appropriate instrument of economic development, and was already having adverse effects upon the youth of the country.
Against that background, he declared (to thunderous applause from the Government benches) that the Government had decided to bring an end to the National Lottery, effective June 1, 1972.
Two months later, on July 4, during his contribution to the annual Budget Debate, Opposition Spokesman on Finance, Edward Seaga, took the Government to task for its decision to abolish the National Lottery, and more particularly, what he saw as the moral inconsistencies in its policies towards gambling.
The National Lottery, he argued, "did not introduce reliance on gambling in Jamaica; the National Lottery did not draw a crowd of people lingering in shops all morning, every morning, away from productive work. That is reliance on gambling."
Furthermore, he argued, the existence of the National Lottery had been the greatest deterrent to the illegal peaka-peow, which, he claimed, had re-emerged to fill the void since the announcement of the abolition of the National Lottery.
In the meantime, he said, the betting shops were doing a roaring business: "On Saturdays nobody wants to work any more ask the constructors, the carpenters, they will tell you. That is where there is a lack of self-reliance, where it is bred and nurtured. The Government must be consistent. Stop the Lottery if they want, innocent as it is in keeping people away from work and guilty as it is of finding work. But don't hypocritically assert that this is to clear the deck for any moral offensive opposed to self-reliance, when the Government is reliant on gambling for revenue and now proposes to make itself more reliant on that form of activity by increasing the tax on it." To which his Opposition colleagues chimed in "Shame! Shame! Shame!"
Mr. Seaga then accused the Government of hypocrisy in the matter, saying that abolishing the National Lottery was its way of paying political debts: "It has given away a lottery revenue of one million dollars to pick up approximately two million, preferably from horseracing and relying on the bookmakers. Somewhere along the line the Government can be felt to be acting in protection of certain interests. If it is not, Mr. Speaker, it should shed its hypocrisy. It cannot be acting in a manner in which it can be accused of speaking with the voice of Jacob and acting with the hand of Esau and Government must act in a way consistent with its own moral posture."
Nor did the Church escape the wrath of Edward Seaga. "Nothing has shocked this country more than the political posture of the church in recent months," he declared.
This time it was the Government Members' turn to cry "Shame! Shame! Shame!" Undeterred, Mr. Seaga called on the church to "put an end to the gambling dens operated by the church on behalf of the church. The church cannot expect to preach morality and indulge in immorality at the same time!"
E. M
