Minister of Labour Pearnel Charles has turned the spotlight on the granting of work permits suggesting that glitches or chicanery in the system has allowed many persons who came to the country as immigrant labourers to disappear without any indication of their whereabouts. He has also expressed concern that foreigners are being given jobs which should be offered to Jamaicans as a matter of priority.

These are legitimate matters of public concern which should be looked at carefully with an eye to the big picture and without the mounting of soap boxes.

Mr. Charles himself seems not be to clear whether the 20,000 persons whom he says cannot be accounted for are still in Jamaica. As he told a press conference last week, the ministry has moved to strengthen its inspectorate division so as to better track immigrant workers. This is important, for with all the concerns about Jamaica being a transhipment point for narcotics, we should be careful not to allow any number of persons to come in as legitimate employees and then slip under the radar into illegal activities.

If Mr. Charles' primary aim is to bring some order to the system, then a 10-day period is much too short for persons, who for any number of legitimate reasons, may not have applied for an extension of their time in the country. His threat that after 10 days, persons who fail to legitimise their status will be taken to the airport for deportation seems designed more to demonstrate that he is tough and committed to doing something. This is hardly helpful, however.

At the same time, we do not share the perspective of those who see a contradiction in Mr. Charles' hard-line position insisting that Jamaicans be given preference for locally available jobs and his celebrating the expansion in the overseas employment opportunities.

In the main, Jamaicans are being invited to fill jobs overseas that may not be attractive to their residents or for which we have specialist skills. As we understand it, the principle enunciated by Mr. Charles is that work permits should be granted only where no suitable Jamaican can be found for the job.

The realities of globalisation notwithstanding, it does not augur well for social stability to have a mass of unemployed Jamaicans looking on while expatriates are given preferred employment. We have seen how potentially explosive this can be in some of the construction projects in the tourism industry.

On the other hand, many Jamaican workers need not only to develop new skills, but new attitudes as well. We quite understand why some employers might prefer to have foreigners - the disregard for time aa well as general indifference common to some projects, simply translate into lost income. Businessmen and women do not invest in projects primarily as charity. They expect a return on their investment, and in good time.

So, despite Mr. Charles' vigorous insistence on Jamaicans first for available jobs, as a society, we need to address what we do and how we go about the business of work.