Brown wa­ter flow­ing from house­hold taps is not a pub­lic re­la­tions prob­lem. It is a mat­ter of pub­lic health, dig­ni­ty and pub­lic trust. When res­i­dents see vis­i­bly dis­coloured wa­ter and are told it is safe, they are en­ti­tled to clear ev­i­dence, prompt ex­pla­na­tions and full trans­paren­cy.

Min­is­ter of Pub­lic Util­i­ties Bar­ry Padarath has at­trib­uted the dis­coloura­tion to sed­i­ment dis­turbed dur­ing ad­just­ments to the trans­mis­sion sys­tem and the restora­tion of nor­mal pres­sure af­ter re­cent main­te­nance work by the De­sali­na­tion Com­pa­ny of Trinidad and To­ba­go. He says the Wa­ter and Sew­er­age Au­thor­i­ty (WASA) has be­gun flush­ing af­fect­ed ar­eas and con­sid­ers the wa­ter safe for do­mes­tic use.

Those as­sur­ances, how­ev­er, leave im­por­tant ques­tions unan­swered. Which com­mu­ni­ties are af­fect­ed? What test­ing has been con­duct­ed, where and when? Do the re­sults re­flect wa­ter qual­i­ty at con­sumers’ taps, in­clud­ing homes at the far ends of the dis­tri­b­u­tion net­work? When will flush­ing be com­plet­ed, and what fol­low-up mon­i­tor­ing will con­firm that the prob­lem has been re­solved?

Res­i­dents should nev­er have to choose be­tween of­fi­cial as­sur­ances and the ev­i­dence be­fore their eyes. Nor should they be left guess­ing whether wa­ter is safe for drink­ing, cook­ing, bathing or use by chil­dren, old­er adults and oth­er vul­ner­a­ble peo­ple. Clear guid­ance must ex­plain what is known, what re­mains un­der in­ves­ti­ga­tion and where the pub­lic can ob­tain as­sis­tance or re­port con­tin­u­ing prob­lems.

The Op­po­si­tion’s chal­lenge for the min­is­ter to drink the wa­ter may gen­er­ate head­lines, but it does lit­tle to an­swer the pub­lic’s con­cerns. A glass-drink­ing demon­stra­tion is not a sub­sti­tute for trans­par­ent test­ing, in­de­pen­dent ver­i­fi­ca­tion and pub­lished re­sults.

At the same time, the Gov­ern­ment should re­sist the temp­ta­tion to dis­miss crit­i­cism by cit­ing past in­ci­dents or pro­ce­dur­al dis­putes. Pub­lic con­fi­dence is not re­stored through po­lit­i­cal point-scor­ing. It is re­stored through facts, open­ness and ac­count­abil­i­ty. What­ev­er dis­agree­ments ex­ist in Par­lia­ment, the pub­lic still de­serves a full ac­count­ing of what has oc­curred and what is be­ing done to ad­dress it

That ac­count­ing should come with­out de­lay. WASA and the Gov­ern­ment should pub­lish test re­sults, iden­ti­fy sam­pling lo­ca­tions, ex­plain the cause and ex­tent of the dis­coloura­tion, spec­i­fy the ar­eas af­fect­ed and pro­vide a clear timetable for flush­ing and re­me­di­a­tion. If test­ing is on­go­ing, of­fi­cials should say so and com­mit to reg­u­lar pub­lic up­dates. Health ad­vice must be clear, ac­ces­si­ble and con­sis­tent across all of­fi­cial chan­nels.

Ac­cess to safe drink­ing wa­ter is a ba­sic hu­man right. It is not a po­lit­i­cal favour and should nev­er be­come col­lat­er­al dam­age in par­ti­san bat­tles. Gov­ern­ments may change and par­ties may trade blame, but the pub­lic’s right to a safe and re­li­able wa­ter sup­ply re­mains con­stant.

Op­po­si­tion MPs have a du­ty to scru­ti­nise. Min­is­ters have a du­ty to an­swer. WASA has a du­ty to pro­vide re­li­able ser­vice and cred­i­ble ev­i­dence on wa­ter qual­i­ty. Cit­i­zens should not have to chal­lenge of­fi­cials to drink brown wa­ter be­fore their con­cerns are treat­ed se­ri­ous­ly. They de­serve facts, prac­ti­cal guid­ance and proof that their wa­ter is safe.

The is­sue is not pol­i­tics. It is trust. And trust re­quires trans­paren­cy.