At a time of increasing anguish and cynicism about the likelihood that T&T is losing the war on crime, the decision by the Ministry of National Security's Counter Trafficking Unit (CTU) to co-ordinate and lead raids on a Port-of-Spain restaurant on Monday and Tuesday is a welcome morsel of good news for a population that has been battered by bad news.
The first and most positive aspect of the operations this week is the fact that the CTU led law enforcement officials from several different agencies, including police officers from the Port-of-Spain Division, officers from the Inter-Agency Task Force (IATF) and the Traffic Branch, along with public health inspectors and labour inspectors.
It is a significant development in local law enforcement that all of these arms of the ministry were able come together and execute a search of a restaurant that addressed several potential breaches of T&T laws, including immigration, sanitation regulations, selling alcohol without a licence and potential labour violations.
That the operations took place without the target being forewarned and during the week preceding Christmas, may be an indication that T&T's law enforcement agencies are not totally demoralised and without hope.
Minister of National Security Edmund Dillon should ensure that such multi-agency operations are repeated enough times to send the message that this country will not tolerate a situation in which people are being brought into this country to work illegally and are then exploited for the benefit of their employers.
Part of problem with law enforcement agencies in T&T is with these brilliant, but occasional, efforts. When speed guns were introduced to curb speeding and breathalysers to reduce drunk driving, there was a great deal of excitement and, initially, a greater adherence to the relevant laws.
But those periods of obedience soon petered out as people realised that they could breach the speed limit laws without sanction and take the risk of drinking all night and then thinking about getting behind the wheel of a vehicle.
For law enforcement to be taken seriously, the Ministry of National Security needs to emphasise consistency of effort over an extended period of time, so that the population stops viewing speeding and drunk driving as being risk-free endeavours.
Minister Dillion should use the success of this week's operations against the Port-of-Spain restaurant as a model for a reinvigorated crime-fighting effort.
He should insist that the CTU take the same team of law enforcers to the hotels around the country that charge by the hour for their rooms and in which women from all over the hemisphere ply their illegal trade.
And the minister would be well advised to insist that the police high command adopt similar co-ordinated multi-agency efforts over next ten days of the Christmas and Old Year's celebrations.
It should not be too difficult for the police to organise and co-ordinate speed traps and road blocks around the country manned by officers with speed guns and breathalysers, along with officials from the Licensing Division, the Canine Unit and the Firearm Bureau.
Such an effort is sure to be rewarded by a significant decline in road deaths, murders and other crimes across the country.