In a press briefing with reporters on Wednesday, Prime Minister Bruce Golding, by and large, struck a note of realism on the economic and social issues facing Jamaica, indicating that he has begun the deeper transformation from Opposition leader to head of Government.

There is obviously no magic wand to be waved to eliminate the difficulties and, as the PM suggested, there are hard choices to be made. It was more than a hint that many of the bigger-ticket social items proposed by Mr. Golding's party during the campaign will they did not say so specifically, have to wait. Or, they will not, at this point, be executed in the fullness that supporters had hoped.

But, as they say, recognition of a problem is a good start to finding its solution. That, to us, was a significant part of what was right about the Prime Minister's briefing.

That is why we endorse his signal approach to a social-partnership agreement - or what the private sector people have called the 'Partnership for Progress' negotiations.

Those talks, along the lines of what was done in Ireland and Barbados, are aimed at setting out parameters within which to operate the country's economy; those boundaries would be outside politically partisan or sectoral tug of war. In the past, the political Opposition was hardly effusive in any embrace of these discussions. They feared that co-option would narrow the political space within which they operate and perhaps help to entrench the party in power. Unfortunately, the previous administration did not work hard enough to mitigate those fears and to bring all stakeholders aboard.

Mr. Golding seems now to have transcended those notions. He says he now wants the Opposition in "on the ground floor" of the negotiations. We agree!

Accepting a broad framework within which the economy will operate and establishing broad performance targets to which all can adhere do not limit the scope of an Opposition to develop specific policies or distinctive tactical approaches to their execution and/or achievement. We just do not want to make it a political football. That is why we hope that the Opposition will not reject any invitation by the PM to be part of the revived talks. A prosperous Jamaica is not bad for the Opposition. Rather, it's good for all of us.

On another matter, Mr. Golding has announced that the constituency fund of 2.5 per cent of the overall budget that was among his campaign promises will not be in the coming budget at the projected level. Fiscal constraints make that impractical. The PM could not say, however, what the level of outlay would be. Hopefully, it will be zero.

As we have pointed out before, Mr. Golding's promise of oversight notwithstanding, the idea of the fund is a bad one. Like with the Social and Economic Support Programme which it will expand, this will soon degenerate into a trough of political pork. We expect, of course, that most MPs will back the initiative. Politicians, after all, like the feel of fat dripping through their fingers.

When Mr. Golding first spoke about the fund, it was to have been five per cent of the budget. Reality pushed it to half that. Common sense is making it less. Wisdom, hopefully, will drive it to nothing.