Shas­tri Boodan

Garbage col­lec­tion con­trac­tors have fall­en un­der the scruti­ny of lo­cal gov­ern­ment min­is­ter Su­ruj Ram­bachan, who has ex­pressed his dis­sat­is­fac­tion with how they op­er­ate. Ram­bachan on Mon­day said that across Trinidad col­lec­tors op­er­ate at er­rat­ic hours and do not stick to the times spec­i­fied in their con­tract. Speak­ing to the me­dia at around 10.30 am, Ram­bachan said ob­served that in the San Juan area, garbage had not been col­lect­ed. He was at the time wind­ing up a tour of Un­em­ploy­ment Re­lief Pro­gramme projects in the San Juan and Ch­agua­nas ar­eas. Al­though con­trac­tors are paid to sup­ply the scav­eng­ing staff with the rel­e­vant safe­ty equip­ment for garbage col­lec­tion, con­trac­tors are fail­ing to give their staff the cor­rect at­tire, Ram­bachan said. A proac­tive ap­proach must be tak­en by the heads of re­gion­al bod­ies to en­sure that the check­ers work­ing with re­gion­al bod­ies keep an eye on garbage trucks, he added. Ram­bachan said on sev­er­al oc­ca­sions the check­ers could not be found.