Robert Buddan

Abe Dabdoub's decision to cross the floor of parliament and join the People's National Party (PNP) while sticking to his position on the importance of campaign finance laws bring together some important considerations that first came to parliamentary prominence 60 years ago. Those events merit reflection in light of current debates.

The Speaker of the House of Representatives, Clement Aitcheson ( representing the Jamaica Labour Party - JLP), made a ruling on June 4,1947, as follows:

"Resignations from a party or change of one member from one political party to another is really not a subject for discussion in this House. In England, members change their parties and that is not supposed to be a reflection on them, as far as the House of Commons is concerned. And even if a member were paid to change his party, that is no affair of ours here. As far as the law is concerned, the House would have to take cognisance of any offer of bribe to influence a member to vote in the House or to refrain from voting in the House. But even if a member was influenced by monetary considerations to change his party, I have to make a ruling that that is not an affair with which this House can concern itself."

The ruling

The background to this ruling is this. On March 5, 1947, House members elected Clifford Campbell to the Executive Council as a provisional member. He received 21 votes, but at least two JLP members, Lester Simmonds and Hugh Cork, abstained. This upset Alexander Bustamante, the Majority Leader, badly. He brutally accused Simmonds of wanting the position but not having the brains to be on the executive. He said those who had abstained were traitors of the worse kind and told them that they could get out of the party and get out of the House.

Simmonds took objection and at the end of March rumours had reached Bustamante of impending resignations from his party. Isaac Barrant and Jehoida McPherson claimed that money had been offered to them of up to £100 to join disaffected members in forming another party. Lawton Bloomfield added that a salary of £1,000 a year had been offered to him, which was about what House members were earning. On another occasion he said £500 had been offered. They named disaffected JLP members as the ones making the offers.

MONEY PLOT

Norman Manley had waded in on the controversy in a speech at Edelweiss Park, saying that money was behind the intrigue. Bustamante agreed. He said that £15,000 had been offered to get 11 JLP members of the House to vote with the PNP and independent members to get him off the Executive Council. The money, he said, came from the employer class, which resented the new constitution of 1944 giving the right to vote. On another occasion he named powerful members of the Sugar Manufacturers Association, including his nemesis, Robert Kirkwood, as the force behind the plot.

Bustamante and his powerful trade union were in ongoing conflicts with the sugar manufacturers over industrial matters and he commanded 45,000 sugar workers. The employer class hoped, he said, to undercut his power. He had won £4 million in wage increases for sugar workers since 1938, and £15,000 was a drop in the bucket for them to invest in his downfall to save

them paying more wage increases.

The expected resignations occurred on April 4. Five JLP members of the House subsequently took their place as Independent members and formed the Agricultural and Industrial Party by November. This was and remains the largest resignation en bloc from a party in the House. The five said that the JLP had failed to fulfil its election promises and was a dictatorial party.

Not a parliamentary matter

Lessons can be learnt from this episode. Change of party membership is a party, not a parliamentary, matter, and so no business of the House. If a member is bribed to switch parties, it is still a party matter and not a House business. Speaker Aitcheson said that even if taking bribes was a dishonour to the members concerned, to their country and to their God, it was not sufficient to make it House business. His concern was with members' privileges, not their politics. He said, "I do not recognise party politics in the House at all."

Bustamante argued that it was a constitutional matter because if all the members of the majority were to be bribed then the Government would fall, and Government would be under pressure from those who were supplying the money. Bustamante did not have proof other than hearsay and allegation about the plot against him, and the Speaker ruled that it only mattered to him if a member was bribed to vote or refrain from voting on a House matter.

Yet, Bustamante raised a critical point still worth considering. Moneyed interests can bring down a government elected by the people if they buy off enough votes and MPs to undermine the government's majority. Despite this recognition, Bustamante never called for transparency and integrity laws for representatives and for campaign finance laws to preserve the new constitution. No other House member did. This was a missed opportunity.

Thankfully, no Jamaican government has been brought down this way and we don't know that any representative has ever crossed the floor or voted on a bill for money. But a 'cash for questions' scandal occurred in Britain in the 1990s when MPs took money to ask parliamentary questions of interest to companies. Currently, the British police are investigating the 'cash for honours' scandal to see if the British Prime Minister and MPs have taken money for campaigns in exchange for awarding peerages to the House of Lords, a practice that was banned in 1925.

DABDOUB'S BILL

All of this makes Mr. Dabdoub's insistence on a law for political parties and for transparent campaign laws more pertinent. Mr. Dabdoub has countered Mr. Golding on two points, saying Mr. Seaga has denied having had any agreement with either Mr. Patterson or Mr. Manley on public funding for party campaigns as Golding said he had; and that the Bill he introduced for a law on political parties is in fact vital to empower the Electoral Commission to fulfil its responsibilities for regulating campaign financing.

Mr. Dabdoub says that Mr. Golding, who says the JLP will not participate in any Joint Select Committee established to consider the Bill, is circumventing debate on the Registration and Funding of Political Parties Act. Mr. Dabdoub makes the important point that the House of Representatives is elected by the people and should have responsibility for making a law on party funding, not the Electoral Commission.

The Secretary General of the Organisation of American States, visiting Jamaica last week, said the goal of the OAS is to have 'clear and strong legislation on matters of campaign financing in each country of the region'. Mr. Golding has already written a paper for the OAS saying he did not support automatic disclosure. He must remember Bustamante's warning that government will be under pressure from those who are supplying the money to a governing party. This is too important a matter to be a secret.

Robert Buddan lectures in the Department of Government, UWI. Email: Robert.Buddan@uwimona.edu.jm.