Gail Alexan­der

Leg­is­la­tion to curb squat­ting and "dra­mat­i­cal­ly" in­crease le­gal fees to en­cour­age at­tor­neys to rep­re­sent clients are on Gov­ern­ment's agen­da for the new Par­lia­men­tary ses­sion, says Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar. Speak­ing at a House of Rep­re­sen­ta­tives ses­sion fol­low­ing yes­ter­day's Par­lia­men­tary launch, Per­sad-Bisses­sar added: "I call for co-op­er­a­tion from all - Gov­ern­ment and Op­po­si­tion - in the na­tion­al in­ter­est as we con­front so­cial, eco­nom­ic and oth­er chal­lenges. I ask that we work to­geth­er, maybe more in­ten­sive­ly." Per­sad-Bisses­sar wel­comed back for­mer prime min­is­ter Patrick Man­ning who was sus­pend­ed from the Par­lia­ment last month. She said: "Let me wel­come back my erst­while col­league, the MP for San Fer­nan­do East." Amid ap­plause, Man­ning got up and bowed to the Prime Min­is­ter. Per­sad-Bisses­sar said she would heed ad­vice of­fered by Pres­i­dent George Maxwell Richards dur­ing yes­ter­day's cer­e­mo­ny. She said: "His com­ments are very in­ter­est­ing to us. We'll take guid­ance from his com­ment re­gard­ing di­ver­si­fi­ca­tion of the econ­o­my and in bio-tech­nol­o­gy and nano-tech­nol­o­gy he spoke of. "Those ar­eas we in­tend to ad­dress in the new ses­sion. "I give the com­mit­ment that my eyes will fo­cus on the next gen­er­a­tion," she added on Richards' re­marks.

Af­ter pass­ing ten pieces of an­ti-crime leg­is­la­tion in the last year, Per­sad-Bisses­sar said Gov­ern­ment would con­tin­ue leg­is­la­tion to equip po­lice, deal with so­cial is­sues and im­prove cit­i­zens' lives. That in­clud­ed the re­vamped "dan­ger­ous dogs" leg­is­la­tion, she said. Oth­er pro­posed laws would seek to abol­ish pre­lim­i­nary in­quiries, give spe­cial coun­sel to chil­dren and to reg­u­late pri­vate se­cu­ri­ty firms, she said. A new DNA bill, re­gard­ing the lat­est tech­nol­o­gy and land re­form laws to par­tic­u­lar­ly as­sist To­bag­o­ni­ans, al­so were ahead, she added. Per­sad-Bisses­sar thanked col­leagues, in­clud­ing Op­po­si­tion Leader Kei­th Row­ley and PNM chief whip Mar­lene Mc­Don­ald. She laud­ed House Speak­er Wade Mark whom she said had tak­en de­bate to a high­er lev­el by en­forc­ing the Stand­ing Or­ders.

Per­sad-Bisses­sar said yes­ter­day's func­tion would be the last cer­e­mo­ni­al open­ing of Par­lia­ment in the Red House for the next two years per­haps, since the Red House was sched­uled for ren­o­va­tion. She said there were re­cent ex­pe­ri­ences where the elec­tric­i­ty went out and Par­lia­ment staff al­so felt un­safe.

The PM said mem­bers would re­turn to the Red House when re­pairs end­ed. Yes­ter­day, Peo­ples Part­ner­ship PP MP Jairam Seemu­n­gal was elect­ed deputy House Speak­er, re­plac­ing Dr Fuad Khan, now Health Min­is­ter. As guests left the Cham­ber as the sit­ting end­ed, Min­is­ter Ru­pert Grif­fith tripped on car­pet­ing and al­most fell. He lost a shoe and spent a cou­ple min­utes try­ing to re­gain it. Works Min­is­ter Jack Warn­er who left the ses­sion im­me­di­ate­ly as pro­ceed­ings end­ed, didn't stay for the sub­se­quent re­cep­tion. The first piece of leg­is­la­tion laid yes­ter­day (for fu­ture de­bate) con­cerns "PH dri­vers" which Warn­er had at­tempt­ed to present in the last ses­sion. The House has ad­journed to a date to be fixed.