More Ministers

Increasing the Size of Executive Council. I may have misheard. It was on the radio yesterday as I was driving back from a most strenuous walk. I was not concentrating. It was the Hon Chief Minister speaking. He was saying something about going to London. He was explaining that the burden on the existing four ministers is unbearable. There is a need to increase the size of the Executive Council to share the burden of government. He was saying that he was going to “ask permission” to have a fifth Minister appointed.

I could not understand what he was saying.

Then, I heard him say that he wanted this done “before the Constitution was changed”. I was dumbfounded! I could not believe what I was hearing.

As every Anguillian schoolchild knows, section 23 of the 1982 Constitution of Anguilla says that ExCo consists of the Chief Minister and “not more than three other Ministers”. It is in the Constitution! The Constitution limits the maximum number of Ministers to four. The Constitutional and Electoral Reform Commission has reported since August 2006 that a majority of Anguillians making representations to the Commission want to see ExCo increased in size. They also are clear that this is on one condition. The number of Ministers must never again exceed fifty percent of the elected members of the House. To do otherwise is to completely gut the House of Assembly and make it useless as a check or balance on the Executive branch of government. There are only seven elected members of the House. Most Anguillians want to see that number increased to thirteen. Then, there can be an increase of ExCo, or Cabinet, to five or six. See paragraph 37 of the Report [link here]. The correct balance will thus be maintained.

The Hon Chief Minister is no dummy. He well knows that no one can increase the size of ExCo without changing the Constitution. Not even the British Government can alter this. Not even the Queen can authorize such a change without changing the Constitution. The Constitution cannot be changed without the consent of the people of Anguilla. The people have spoken through the representations they made to the Commission during the year 2006. The only way that the number of Ministers can properly be increased is by following the voice of the people as heard in paragraph 37 of the Constitutional and Electoral Commission Report.

Of course, I may have completely misheard. Worse mistakes have happened!