O’Neill slams MPs’ absence in Parliament

Members of Parliament are not getting their priorities right in serving the people, Prime Minister Peter O’Neill says.
He said this in Parliament last week after the Opposition bench was empty when the village court status report was presented.
O’Neill said MPs were elected to speak on issues like the village courts, however, Opposition MPs seemed to be working for their personal interests.
“I think they should be working in a circus and not in Parliament,” he said.
“I think it’s important that both sides of the house should support such initiatives.
“We should continue to work together so that services are really going down to the village.”
O’Neill said frontline Government officers were village leaders like councillors and village court magistrates.
He said the Government recognised their efforts and put them on payroll.
“This must continue,” O’Neill said.
“We must continue to provide allowances. We must ensure that we have a smaller government in the villages because they are in frontline operations in the village, and this is where it matters most.
“This is where we should spent most of our funding.
“That is why we had our Government policy in the Alotau Accord 1 and 2.
“We tried to bring our focus to the provinces and districts to work with them to deliver services.
“Today, we seem to spend a lot of money on sending members of the disciplinary forces and public servants to areas where there are problems. They are getting huge allowance to do their jobs.
“Despite all these, they are not discharging their duties and the same problems are occurring daily.
“This is because there is no one-off intervention to the problems that we have.
“I think the long-term solution is to maintain a strong leadership at the ward and village level.”