There is a phrase that has re­mained with me through­out the de­bate on the Fi­nance Bill.

A na­tion can­not fine its way to pros­per­i­ty.

Not be­cause laws should not be en­forced. They should. Not be­cause ac­count­abil­i­ty does not mat­ter. It does. And cer­tain­ly not be­cause those who break the law should es­cape con­se­quences.

But be­cause the role of a gov­ern­ment is larg­er than pun­ish­ment. The role of a gov­ern­ment is to cre­ate the con­di­tions for growth, op­por­tu­ni­ty and na­tion­al progress.

That is why the re­cent de­bate on the Fi­nance Bill rais­es a trou­bling ques­tion.

When cit­i­zens look at this leg­is­la­tion, what vi­sion of the fu­ture are they be­ing of­fered? Is it a vi­sion of eco­nom­ic ex­pan­sion, in­vest­ment and job cre­ation? Or is it a vi­sion built pri­mar­i­ly around penal­ties, sanc­tions and de­ter­rence?

The an­swer mat­ters be­cause leg­is­la­tion re­veals pri­or­i­ties.

Gov­ern­ments can make promis­es. But when leg­is­la­tion comes be­fore Par­lia­ment, it tells us what tru­ly oc­cu­pies the minds of those in pow­er. To be fair, the Fi­nance Bill con­tains mea­sures be­yond in­creased penal­ties. It in­cludes pro­vi­sions deal­ing with tax­a­tion, pen­sions, en­er­gy-sec­tor in­cen­tives and oth­er ad­min­is­tra­tive re­forms.

Yet it is im­pos­si­ble to ig­nore the re­al­i­ty that the most vis­i­ble and wide­ly dis­cussed as­pects of the Bill have been the sub­stan­tial in­creas­es in fines and penal­ties across nu­mer­ous pieces of leg­is­la­tion.

The is­sue has nev­er been about the fines them­selves. Every so­ci­ety re­quires laws and penal­ties. The is­sue was what their promi­nence re­vealed. At the mo­ment when cit­i­zens were look­ing for an­swers on growth, jobs and the cost of liv­ing, the na­tion­al con­ver­sa­tion be­came dom­i­nat­ed by pun­ish­ment, com­pli­ance and en­force­ment.

That pub­lic re­ac­tion did not emerge by ac­ci­dent.

It emerged be­cause peo­ple in­stinc­tive­ly un­der­stand the dif­fer­ence be­tween a gov­ern­ment fo­cused on pun­ish­ing peo­ple and a gov­ern­ment fo­cused on ex­pand­ing op­por­tu­ni­ty.

To­day, fam­i­lies across Trinidad and To­ba­go are wor­ried about the cost of liv­ing. Small busi­ness­es are strug­gling with ris­ing op­er­at­ing costs. Young grad­u­ates are won­der­ing whether they will find mean­ing­ful op­por­tu­ni­ties at home. Many cit­i­zens feel that, de­spite their hard work, they are run­ning hard­er sim­ply to stand still.

Against that back­drop, the pub­lic has every right to ask, where is the growth agen­da? Where is the pros­per­i­ty agen­da? Where is the eco­nom­ic vi­sion that match­es the scale of the chal­lenges fac­ing the coun­try?

These are not par­ti­san ques­tions. They are na­tion­al ques­tions. No coun­try has ever achieved sus­tain­able pros­per­i­ty through penal­ties alone. No econ­o­my has grown be­cause fines have be­come larg­er. No in­vestor has cho­sen a coun­try be­cause its sanc­tions have be­come more se­vere.

Pros­per­i­ty is built through con­fi­dence, in­vest­ment, in­no­va­tion and pro­duc­tiv­i­ty. That is the con­ver­sa­tion many cit­i­zens ex­pect­ed from a Fi­nance Bill. In­stead, pub­lic at­ten­tion has been drawn pri­mar­i­ly to in­creased penal­ties and fines.

While Par­lia­ment de­bat­ed high­er penal­ties un­der a range of laws, many cit­i­zens were hav­ing a very dif­fer­ent con­ver­sa­tion. They were talk­ing about gro­cery prices, mort­gage pay­ments, rent, util­i­ty bills, job op­por­tu­ni­ties and whether their chil­dren will have a fu­ture in Trinidad and To­ba­go.

The Gov­ern­ment ar­gues that stronger penal­ties en­cour­age com­pli­ance. Per­haps in some cas­es they do. But com­pli­ance, while im­por­tant, is not a de­vel­op­ment strat­e­gy.

En­force­ment is not an eco­nom­ic plan. Pun­ish­ment is not a sub­sti­tute for growth.

There is al­so a deep­er ques­tion. If ex­ist­ing laws were not be­ing ad­e­quate­ly en­forced, why should cit­i­zens be­lieve that sim­ply in­creas­ing the penal­ties will sud­den­ly trans­form out­comes? The ef­fec­tive­ness of a law has nev­er de­pend­ed sole­ly on the size of the fine at­tached to it. It de­pends on en­force­ment, ad­min­is­tra­tion and in­sti­tu­tion­al ca­pac­i­ty.

In­creas­ing a fine is com­par­a­tive­ly easy. Build­ing ef­fec­tive in­sti­tu­tions is much hard­er.

Yet the fun­da­men­tal ques­tions re­main un­re­solved. How do we grow the econ­o­my? How do we im­prove com­pet­i­tive­ness? How do we at­tract in­vest­ment? How do we cre­ate op­por­tu­ni­ties that per­suade tal­ent­ed young peo­ple to build their fu­tures here rather than else­where?

These are the ques­tions that will de­ter­mine the fu­ture of Trinidad and To­ba­go. Not the size of a fine. Cit­i­zens are not ask­ing for less ac­count­abil­i­ty. They are ask­ing for more lead­er­ship. They want to know where the coun­try is head­ing. They want to know how eco­nom­ic growth will be gen­er­at­ed. They want to know what op­por­tu­ni­ties will ex­ist for their chil­dren.

That is why the de­bate sur­round­ing this Fi­nance Bill should not fo­cus nar­row­ly on the tech­ni­cal de­tails of in­di­vid­ual penal­ties. The larg­er is­sue is what those pri­or­i­ties re­veal.

While the Gov­ern­ment has clear­ly ar­tic­u­lat­ed an en­force­ment and com­pli­ance agen­da, many cit­i­zens are still wait­ing to hear a sim­i­lar­ly com­pelling ar­tic­u­la­tion of its long-term growth agen­da.

At a mo­ment when the coun­try des­per­ate­ly needs a vi­sion for eco­nom­ic ex­pan­sion, pro­duc­tiv­i­ty and op­por­tu­ni­ty, pub­lic at­ten­tion has been drawn in­stead to penal­ties, de­ter­rence and sanc­tions. The cit­i­zens of Trinidad and To­ba­go de­serve more than a gov­ern­ment that tells them what will hap­pen if they fail. They de­serve a gov­ern­ment that shows them what is pos­si­ble if they suc­ceed. Be­cause in the end, the mea­sure of lead­er­ship is not how ef­fec­tive­ly it pun­ish­es mis­con­duct. It is how ef­fec­tive­ly it cre­ates hope. And hope, un­like fear, has al­ways been the foun­da­tion up­on which pros­per­ous na­tions are built.

A na­tion can­not fine its way to pros­per­i­ty.

Mick­ela Pan­day, po­lit­i­cal leader of the Pa­tri­ot­ic Front and at­tor­ney at law