Q: Dr Douglas, do you have any respect for authority?
A: (At his St Vincent Street, Port-of-Spain, office Friday morning) Oh yeah, I grew up with my parents in the church and I am a follower of Jesus the Christ and within that religious structure there is a respect for leadership and a commitment to authority.
Is it that you pay credence only to religious authority and not civil authority?
(A curious expression) I respect all authority...that is a good question, but I am wondering what's the rationale behind this line of questioning?
Simple. Recently, you told His Worship the Mayor of Port-of-Spain Alderman Louis Lee Sing to shut up. Wasn't that disrespect to the Mayor?
(Half smiling) I did tell him to shut up and other things, too. I do have a respect for authority but I also am a fierce guard for the truth and order, but the Mayor has consistently spoken about things that he knows nothing about and uses critical issues to make political statements. This particular issue relates to the plight of homeless people in the city which Lee Sing knows that I (fingers touching his chest) personally have been working assiduously on, from the very first day I took up office in this ministry.
Some may say that you were too strident in your admonition of the Mayor by telling him to keep his tongue in his mouth, as it were.
Because Clevon, he is very well aware that this is a very complicated subject which involves several official agencies including health and national security. He is also aware that we in this ministry are not the ones responsible for removal of the homeless off the streets, which is the remit of the police or the Ministry of Health. He likes to take on these popular issues in order to chalk up cheap political points and if you observe his media theatrics, he loves the melodrama in the belief that it would force people to act or to increase his political stocks. I think he really wants to overthrow his leader Dr Keith Rowley (chuckling). But I resent that kind of political grandstanding because he knows better than almost everybody else that you cannot just take people off the streets as he attempted to do early in his stewardship.
But isn't it par for the course for politicians to use any means possible to stay on top of their game?
Yes...the PNM politicians, it seems to be their stock in trade but this is not fair.
You can still do a good job and reap political mileage, and the Mayor had to be put in his place; somebody has to tell him where to jump off.
Ok. Let's leave the goodly Mayor alone and look at your efforts to rid the streets of these unfortunate citizens. Didn't previous administrations put in place mechanisms to deal with this problem, and why do you feel you have to start from scratch at this time?
Yes they did put measures but these were not taken after consulting the people and doing proper research. The last time they did something was to recondition some containers, place them at the St Ann's Hospital, pick up some of the vagrants and hide them away from the delegates attending the Summit of the Americas and the Commonwealth Heads of Government conferences. They simply rounded them up in dog catching style. Today, the containers are non-functional and the people are not there so that did not work.
What are some of the things you have been doing to tackle this problem in a meaningful way?
I have been attempting to line up all the various stakeholders in this issue so that when we move to pick them up, all the elements would collaborate in making it a success; you will have a place to put them, you will have the rehabilitation units and so on.
Can you give or predict a date when the ministry would rid the streets of these people?
It is not a question of predicting because I have done that before which did not materialise. But I have to admit that working in the Government is not that easy to get things implemented for a variety of reasons such as passing legislation, implementing of policies...
I don't want to break your trend of thought but what about the housing of these people in one central location as suggested by the goodly Mayor?
That was a good idea, I must say, but you see the problem with that is that you have people on the streets for various reasons. Some may be HIV or mentally challenged, drug addicts, deportees, social dropouts and so on. You just cannot simply go and take them off the streets and house them, they have to be properly assessed in accordance with their particular issues. And this is why I find sometimes the Mayor is being mischievous when he says you don't need to assess them, all you need to do is grab them off the streets.
What else have you been doing?
Only yesterday, the ministry held a consultation with stakeholders and the street dwellers themselves who were able to tell us what they expected from the State. Some asked for support in finding gainful employment, a separate home and so on. Some of the stakeholders were there including Wayne Chance and I am going back very soon on his radio show.
I gather he recently attacked you on his programme and after cursing the Mayor in this interview, do you think Louis Lee Sing would allow you to return to his station?
(Laughing) I did not curse the Mayor, actually I like the Mayor and we have a fairly good relationship so I don't think he would bar me from coming on his station (Dr Douglas paused to take a call from his daughter), and I do hope he would come while I am there so we could have a verbal slug fest.
Are you now publicly challenging His Worship to a debate on his station?
Well, yes, I am issuing a challenge to the Mayor to join me with Wayne Chance and let us deal with some of the issues that he has been running up and down the place talking about and any other topic he may chose to introduce.
Getting back to the question of prediction. The PP came in to office promising change in the way some things are done in TT, and citizens for years have been pleading for the removal of street dwellers who in some cases attack people going about their lawful business. When can we expect to see the back of this problem? And remember, whatever answer you give is on the record for future reference?
(Playing briefly with a ring in his left ear and laughs) I did say I have given a number of dates eh? And all of them proved futile and trying to predict...however we have a piece of legislation to come up in this session of the Parliament.
Which seeks to do what?
This measure seeks to give the authority to remove people, involuntarily, to hold for a period of time so that they can be rehabilitated. That is a really tricky piece of legislation. This will require the support of the Opposition since no doubt it would be dealing with these people constitutional rights. Yes.
Are you optimistic that everything will be in place by the time the next general election comes around?
(Confidently shaking his head) Oh yes. Oh yes. We should get the legislation passed by the end of the year and by early in the new year we would have completed one building (to house some of the targeted group). OK, I am predicting that by the first quarter of the new year we will begin to see clarity of things in this regard.
I gather the ministry is also tackling the burning question of poverty reduction and what is the classic definition of a poor person.
Yes, this PP administration is working assiduously on poverty reduction as we have made a commitment to reduce poverty by two per cent annually and we have estimated there are some 200,000 citizens who are poor. Then we have a population of approximately 10,000 who we call indigent who are really poor-they cannot provide the basic things like food, health and clothing. We work with a number of definitions as to who are poor and it depends on which definition one would chose. You have absolute poverty which deals with a strict financial figure. Street people we consider to be indigent.
Mr Minister, you know there are some people who say that we do not have poor people because we cannot see them and things like that?
Yes. But that is a very real problem in Trinidad and Tobago. From where I sit and the houses where I go in and people who I run into, there are some seriously poor people in Trinidad and Tobago and if you go to some of these areas you will be astonished to see the level of poverty some of us are forced to endure on a daily basis.
Dr Douglas, should we as a nation which had periods of tremendous oil wealth flowing through the country be experiencing so many social problems today including poverty?
(A forlorn expression as he leans the right side of his face on two fingers on his right hand) Clevon, Trinidad and Tobago is really a burden for me, a painful burden. I can't understand why we allowed this country to slip the way we allowed it to. Especially with the amount of oil money we had, the disparity between the rich and the poor; that disparity smacks of mismanagement through the years.