Amid criticisms relative to the Government’s transmission of its achievements and plans to the public, Cabinet Minister Robert Morgan has defended his role as Minister without Portfolio in the Office of Prime Minister (OPM) with responsibility for information.

Calls have come from some Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) bloggers for Morgan to be stripped of the information responsibility at the OPM and replaced by another Government member to better communicate the Administration’s plans and achievements.

At the post-Cabinet press briefing on Wednesday, Morgan insisted that he has been carrying out the functions he has been tasked with under the information division within the OPM.

“The information minister’s duty is to transfer information from Cabinet to the country, which I do here every Wednesday, and which you’re a part (of),” Morgan told reporters.

Additionally, he said the role comes with responsibility for managing a number of public agencies, such as the Jamaica Information Service (JIS) and the Public Broadcasting Corporation of Jamaica (PBCJ), from an oversight and policy perspective.

“The assessment of my performance or lack thereof is determined by the prime minister’s actions and decisions, so I can’t comment on my own performance.

“I have to wait on the prime minister, the Cabinet, and the public to comment on that,” added Morgan.

Last month, the Clarendon North Central Member of Parliament (MP) resigned as the JLP’s public relations committee chairman.

Since then, the calls have been increasing for him to be stripped of his role in the Cabinet.

In responding to a follow-up question on the role of the information division at the OPM, Morgan said such a Ministry of Information does not exist in the Government’s current structure.

“There is no Ministry of Information, and I think that… we have not articulated (that) effectively enough. The minister of information is actually the prime minister (Andrew Holness), and the ministry is the Office of the Prime Minister (OPM),” Morgan said.

Continuing, he said: “I am a minister without portfolio, meaning I do not have a ministry in the Office of the Prime Minister.

“If you look in the budget book, you will not see a line item that says Ministry of Information,” he indicated.

Morgan said the JIS, PBCJ, the Broadcasting Commission of Jamaica (BCJ) and the information division headed by a chief technical director, are all within the purview of that OPM.

He reiterated that his role is to transfer information from Cabinet to the public and, on occasions, answer questions which can bring clarity to issues that are of public concern.

“The ministry, which is OPM, and the department, or the section that speaks to information, are part of a grand ecosystem in Government, where each ministry also has their own… public relations apparatus,” said Morgan.

He said the OPM has to collaborate with all the ministries and the public agencies in order to assist them and vice-versa, which is an overall process that is geared towards getting information to the public.