People’s National Party (PNP) President Mr Mark Golding told the public session of his party’s 86th annual conference on Sunday that a Government led by him will invest in and empower Jamaicans even while maintaining economic and fiscal discipline.

At the core must be education, which was a hot topic at the conference.

Among myriad pledges, Mr Golding told Comrades that a PNP Government would build on the incumbent Administration’s recent move to scrap the guarantor requirement to access funding through the Students’ Loan Bureau.

Under his watch, Mr Golding said tertiary students will only begin loan repayments — capped “at an affordable percentage of their monthly income” — after landing a job.

To make the system even more borrower-friendly, loan repayment will be deferred when the indebted are out of a job.

The Opposition leader has plans for a debt forgiveness programme for teachers based on years of service.

Against a backdrop of teacher migration creating a huge hurdle for schools at every level, Mr Golding argued that “Teachers are the backbone of the education system, and we must show that we truly value them and do whatever is necessary to persuade them to stay…”

With skills training increasingly recognised as crucial, Mr Golding pledged that “every secondary school” will have “state-of-the-art vocational labs” to provide hands-on training for students during the days and for adults in the evenings.

Also, according to Mr Golding, under his leadership, investment partnerships will be built between businesses and the public sector’s skills training institution, HEART/NSTA Trust, to expand training programmes.

As part of what he described as an education system that “is inclusive, equitable and excellent”, Mr Golding is aiming for performance-based incentives at early childhood level and “targeted support” at primary and secondary levels.

This last objective, we believe, ties in with the observation by Opposition spokesman on finance Mr Julian Robinson that, “We cannot start with advanced learning when far too many of our children and young adults are not even reading or doing basic arithmetic at the required levels. There must be a comprehensive national effort to ensure that every child leaves primary school with a strong grasp of literacy and numeracy.”

The harsh truth is that, currently, far too many enter the working world illiterate. Among the reasons for that is widespread “absenteeism” from school, which Opposition spokesman on education Senator Damion Crawford told Comrades is at 37 per cent in rural Jamaica and 18 per cent in urban areas.

We all know that a hard core reason for children staying away from school is economics. Many adults cannot afford to send all their children to school on a regular basis because of the cost of transportation and meals.

Hefty State-funded solutions are needed in a hurry if, as a country, we are to achieve laudable aims such as were outlined by the Opposition party on Sunday; and correct extreme inequalities in education — described by former finance minister and former Opposition Leader Dr Peter Phillips as “educational apartheid in Jamaica”.

Such solutions should happen even as there is adherence to prudent economic and fiscal policies practised seamlessly across administrations over the last 12 years.

Clearly, the challenge ahead for whichever political party controls State power following upcoming parliamentary elections is not for the faint of heart.