While he wel­comes the in­volve­ment of at­tor­neys in shap­ing stand your ground leg­is­la­tion, Min­is­ter of Home­land Se­cu­ri­ty Roger Alexan­der is adamant that voic­es from “all walks of life” must al­so be in­clud­ed in the con­sul­ta­tive process for any law or pol­i­cy.

On Mon­day, At­tor­ney Gen­er­al John Je­re­mie told Guardian Me­dia that the Min­istry of Home­land Se­cu­ri­ty was tasked with as­sem­bling a com­mit­tee to con­sult on the cre­ation of stand your ground leg­is­la­tion.

Je­re­mie said he an­tic­i­pat­ed that once the com­mit­tee was es­tab­lished by the end of June, rec­om­men­da­tions would be laid in Par­lia­ment af­ter the up­com­ing mid-year bud­get re­view.

Stand your ground leg­is­la­tion has been pop­u­larised in the US, which al­lows cit­i­zens to use dead­ly force rather than re­treat if they are in a spe­cif­ic place where they are al­lowed to be (ie, their homes) if they be­lieve they are in dan­ger.

Dur­ing a po­lit­i­cal meet­ing in Cou­va in April 2023, then-op­po­si­tion leader Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar an­nounced that it was her in­ten­tion to bring stand your ground leg­is­la­tion to com­bat home in­va­sions if the UNC was elect­ed.

Speak­ing with Guardian Me­dia yes­ter­day, Alexan­der said he an­tic­i­pat­ed that the com­mit­tee would be formed with­in the next month. 

He said it would con­sist of at­tor­neys, po­lice of­fi­cers and the pub­lic to guide the struc­ture and mech­a­nisms be­hind the law. 

He not­ed that while they would pro­vide valu­able in­sight, at­tor­neys alone would not al­low for a full de­vel­op­ment of the poli­cies. 

“Many times we of­ten cre­ate laws for cit­i­zens based on just be­ing an at­tor­ney, but look at it this way, the at­tor­ney would know the loop­holes, or a de­fence, or a pros­e­cu­tion lim­it for it (the leg­is­la­tion.)”

He not­ed that the pub­lic’s in­sight would al­so be valu­able as he felt the need for them to be in­clud­ed in mat­ters that di­rect­ly af­fect them.