Senior Reporter
akash.samaroo@cnc3.co.tt
Both the Government and Opposition accused each other of having the resources but not the political will to address pressing issues facing the nation.
This occurred during the late session of Parliament on Wednesday evening as the House debated the motion to adopt the report of the Standing Finance Committee.
Former minister of education and St Ann’s East MP Dr Nyan Gadsby-Dolly accused Government of giving the illusion that they care about children but failing to allocate the finances to do so in the Mid-Year Budget Review.
Gadsby-Dolly said in the $3.14 billion that will be supplemented to the new government, she is yet to hear about plans to deal with school violence.
“In the allocation in the report that we’re discussing I saw nothing in this mid-year review for the completion of youth camps, for expanding MiLAT (Military-Led Academic Training Programme) and MYPART (Military-Led Youth Programme of Apprenticeship and Reorientation Training) Programmes and continuing the CCC (Civilian Conservation Corps), I saw none of that. So, I am expecting that those programmes are fully funded,” she posited.
The Opposition MP added, “Because if we care about the children and we have an ongoing issue with school violence and the UNC again they know that it’s been a problem since their time, then I would have expected that some of the funding available would have been used to deal with funding some of these youth programmes.”
The former education minister said a lot was done to address that issue under the PNM administration.
She accused Government of ignoring its financial responsibility to these children and saying one thing with their mouths but not doing what is required.
Of the $3.14 billion, $455.1 million will go to the Education Ministry.
However, in the Standing Finance Committee earlier this week, Minister Dr Michael Dowlath said most of that money will go to paying bills left over by the previous administration.
However, Gadsby-Dolly lamented that no significant funds were dedicated to school repairs and upgrades. She questioned if there was political will to get it done.
The former minister claimed Government was intent on giving laptops to families who can afford them while looking to cut back on book grants for the truly needy.
“I call on the UNC to put the threshold for the book grants back to $10,000 and allow more children to get the book grant that vulnerable children need.”
A major criteria of the book grant programme is a gross household income of $10,000. Gadsby-Dolly is accusing the UNC of lowering it to $8,000 thus disenfranchising financially struggling families.
But Rural Development and Local Government Minister Khadijah Ameen made a similar claim of a lack of political will when it was her turn to speak on Wednesday.
Fresh off visiting flooded communities following last week’s inclement weather, Ameen said she and her team made a startling discovery.
“While we are out there in water up to our waist, up to our neck, fighting up, I am amazed that between the resources of the State, between every regional corporation, the State agencies within the Ministry of Local Government, we were able to attend to flood mitigation like never before without spending an additional cent.”
She added, “I am amazed by all the equipment available there and I am asking myself ‘where was this?’ If you had a government before who had all of this then you know what was lacking? The political will to care for the people.”
Minister Ameen said when they realised how much work was not done in some communities they were appalled.
“We are meeting water courses with a whole tree growing inside it. A whole tree. That didn’t grow overnight, it meant that for 10 years the former government did not clear those water courses. It meant that for 10 years they spent millions and millions and we in opposition at the time asking ‘where the money gone?’”