Prime Minister Bruce Golding. - file

Local viewers of the C-SPAN television network are familiar with the weekly Prime Minister's Question Time, starring the British Prime Minister taking questions on a wide range of subjects during sittings of Parliament at Westminster.

These are largely unscripted moments in which the Prime Minister is required to be quick on his feet if he is to fend off opportunistic barbs from opposition parliamentarians. Prime Minister Tony Blair was particularly good at this, winning the public and wayward backbenchers in his party to his own way of thinking on many important policy issues.

Locally, the new Prime Minister, Bruce Golding, has signalled that he is getting ready to borrow from Tony Blair's playbook, offering to make himself available for a similar grilling once a month.

"I am prepared to come here on that day - the second Tuesday in every month, and I am prepared to field questions without notice," he announced on October 9, to thunderous applause.

In anticipation of those moments when he might not have the answers "in my head," however, he appealed to the members to be understanding when he has to ask them to await research for the answers to be provided.

'No problem'

"Certainly, in terms of general information, general policy, I have no problem with that," he said by way of explaining what he would be prepared to provide at these monthly parliamentary sessions.

The Prime Minister also announced the Government's intention to provide full time legal counsel to Parliament.

It was improper, he argued, for parliamentarians, when considering a bill, to rely on the Government's legal draftsmen. The legislature, he said, should have its own legal advisers, who would make recommendations, where required on the text of the bill.

It was ironic, he said, that the main legal draftsperson for the Government was called Chief Parliamentary Counsel.

That nomenclature should now be given to the person to be appointed legal adviser to the legislature, he suggested.