Chair’s Column
The Telegram Nov. 5, 2016
Governments must adapt to time and change
It is often said that nothing in life is certain except for death and taxes. I beg to differ. One also needs to
consider the ever ticking away of time and change. It’s the opening of the window of opportunity and
how quickly it closes in this day and age. This is due to progress, innovation and new technologies.
We live in a time where no one can be complacent, ever. Not in our personal lives, not in how we run our
businesses and not in how governments deliver their programs and services.
Business today is so much more accessible. You no longer need to acquire physical office or retail space.
All you have to do is open your computer, hop on the Wi-Fi at your nearest coffee shop and you can start
commerce.
There’s no need to fret about raising money because you can easily connect with the nearest
crowdsourcing site, and off you go.
If you need expertise in a particular area of your business, such as marketing or accounting, you engage
labour on demand. People enjoy the flexibility to work with you and several other clients during times
that best suit their busy schedules. As long as they meet your schedule, you’re good to go.
The speed of change is mindboggling. The United States government just developed regulations for
autonomous cars. Insurance companies are now preparing for a drastic reduction in claims from
automobile accidents that will radically affect their business by 2021. That’s only five years away — a
blink of an eye.
This leaves me wondering, how are our governments keeping up with the pace of change?
For example, on a municipal level, is St. John’s ready for autonomous vehicles? What about commercial
building permits? Just five years ago developers were scrambling to get their buildings constructed.
Today you would be hard pressed to find someone who wants to develop a new build. This doesn’t mean
commerce isn’t happening. It just means the space a business is operating from is rapidly changing.
We have also seen that as quickly as things can change for the good, they can also change for the bad.
Few would have predicted that once the price of a barrel of oil hit close to US$150 a barrel it would ever
fall below $100, $50 or even $30 a barrel, but it did.
The message here is we, as a province, have to face these facts. We are heavily dependent on oil
revenues, and in order to be prudent and be good stewards of the people’s treasury, governments should
spend prudently and not over extend. In addition, when revenues are up they should save money and not
spend to the limit.
Unfortunately, we have overextended ourselves as a province, committing too much money to too many
in our public service. We have one of the largest public sectors per capita in the country. On average, we
spend approximately $14,000 per capita to deliver provincial programs and services. The Maritime
average is approximately $10,000 and the Canadian average is about $8,000.
Facing these facts is why we launched the provincial debt clock last week. Every second of every day
that we dither and do nothing, our debt increases by $50.10; every minute, it increases by $3,006; every
hour, it increases by $180,360; every day, it increases by $4,328,640.
This is staggering. Carrying such high levels of debt leaves this province ill-equipped to respond to a
crisis. Carrying this level of debt leaves us unable to adapt and innovate to time and change. Carrying
such a large number of public servants, who are sometimes underemployed or cannot be re-assigned or
retrained due to ironclad contracts, stifles innovation and technology.
Our government must embrace technology in service delivery and, if so, services could be delivered more
effectively.
Our public sector must learn to be nimble, and as workers retire the government must have a proper
workforce plan to ensure employees are trained and ready to meet the needs of the ever-changing
environment in which we live.
The fast pace of time and change is inevitable and we must face the facts. “The world is changing very
fast. Big will not beat small anymore. It will be the fast beating the slow” (Rupert Murdoch).
Des Whelan is the 2016 Chair of the St. John’s Board of Trade.