Having begun his third term as chief secretary of the Tobago House of Assembly (THA), Orville London has written Prime Minister Kamla Persad�Bissessar requesting an urgent meeting with her to discuss issues relating to the THA as stipulated in the Tobago House of Assembly Act No 40 of 1996.
Speaking at the first post-Executive Council news conference since his re-election on January 21, London said the letter dated January 29 was geared at having a more harmonious relationship between the assembly and the central government if there are resolutions. He outlined the areas he felt needed urgent attention.
"Among the issues which I put down for the Prime Minister's consideration would have been issue of the process for the review of the Tobago House of Assembly Act," he said."I also spoke to the funding for housing and the relationship between ministers of government and secretaries of the Tobago House of Assembly...those are three issues that I put down for her perusal because I don't want to put everything because I expect we would meet regularly, so we don't to discuss everything in this first meeting."
London said the most prevalent issue affecting Tobagonians was the process for the review of the THA Act. He said there was an opportunity to take a different approach while not starting over."The recommendation that I am going to put to the Prime Minister is that we have two technical teams, one from the THA and one appointed from the central government with a chairperson who is mutually acceptable and the members of those teams will meet together as a unit to study all the submission, all the processes and so on and coming out of that, we will have a document for public discussion and after that, the document would go the THA, then to Cabinet and then to the Parliament," he said.
London said his executive was prepared to leave the mudslinging of the election campaign behind for the benefit of the people of Tobago, since those times were marred with polarisation.