The roll­out of the State’s new rev­enue col­lec­tion agency, the T&T Rev­enue Au­thor­i­ty, will not be hap­pen­ing on Ju­ly 31. In­stead, it has been de­layed un­til No­vem­ber.

At a court man­age­ment hear­ing yes­ter­day, at the High Court, Fi­nance Min­is­ter Colm Im­bert in­di­cat­ed that an or­der will be passed ex­tend­ing the time for em­ploy­ees at the Board of In­land Rev­enue and the Cus­toms and Ex­cise Di­vi­sion to de­cide their fu­ture un­til No­vem­ber.

The Pub­lic Ser­vices As­so­ci­a­tion, in a me­dia state­ment yes­ter­day signed by its pres­i­dent Leroy Bap­tiste, said the union was pleased with the move.

He said that the lat­est de­vel­op­ment will re­duce the pres­sure placed on pub­lic of­fi­cers who were forced to de­cide on their ca­reers.

“This dead­line was un­fair, un­re­al­is­tic, and un­rea­son­able. It was op­pres­sive be­cause it came in the face of the PSA’s con­sti­tu­tion­al chal­lenge to the le­gal va­lid­i­ty of the TTRA and was an at­tempt to steal a march on the work­ers,” said the union.

Dur­ing the case man­age­ment hear­ing, at­tor­neys for the State in­di­cat­ed that the Gov­ern­ment had de­cid­ed to ex­tend the time, and as such the court gave di­rec­tions and fixed the tri­al for Oc­to­ber 5.

The PSA called on the Gov­ern­ment to com­mit it­self to al­low­ing the law to take its course and de­mand due process, eq­ui­ty, and jus­tice for ag­griev­ed work­ers.

The union not­ed that this was a case of fun­da­men­tal pub­lic and con­sti­tu­tion­al im­por­tance and was com­mit­ted to tak­ing the mat­ter to the Privy Coun­cil.

“We be­lieve that it is nec­es­sary for the high­est court in the land to make a de­fin­i­tive pro­nounce­ment in this mat­ter,” said the PSA.

Back in May, a High Court rul­ing paved the way for the Gov­ern­ment to pro­ceed with the im­ple­men­ta­tion of the Rev­enue Au­thor­i­ty. The terms and con­di­tions of em­ploy­ees have since re­mained a con­cern.

The PSA con­tend­ed that the TTRA was un­con­sti­tu­tion­al and claimed it was sus­cep­ti­ble to po­lit­i­cal in­flu­ence. The union main­tained that the case was not on­ly about the plight of work­ers but al­so the rule of law.

“The PSA is of the clear and firm view that the TTRA is un­con­sti­tu­tion­al and il­le­gal be­cause it is sus­cep­ti­ble to po­lit­i­cal in­flu­ence, ma­nip­u­la­tion and con­trol by the Min­is­ter of Fi­nance. Such a po­lit­i­cal­ly com­pro­mised in­sti­tu­tion can nev­er be in the pub­lic in­ter­est re­gard­less of which par­ty is in pow­er,” it said.

On­ly last week, the PSA had in­struct­ed its at­tor­neys to file an emer­gency ap­peal to the Unit­ed King­dom-based Privy Coun­cil over the dis­missal of an in­junc­tion seek­ing to de­lay the planned im­ple­men­ta­tion of the TTRA.

De­liv­er­ing a writ­ten judg­ment last Wednes­day af­ter­noon, the court re­ject­ed an ap­peal brought by PSA mem­ber and cus­toms of­fi­cer Ter­risa Dho­ray over the re­fusal of High Court Judge Bet­sy Ann Lam­bert-Pe­ter­son to grant her an in­junc­tion over the move, last month.

It was a ma­jor­i­ty rul­ing with Jus­tice Nolan Bereaux and Mark Mo­hammed agree­ing that Jus­tice Lam­bert-Pe­ter­son was cor­rect to de­ny the in­junc­tion.

Jus­tice Pe­ter Ra­jku­mar pro­vid­ed a dis­sent­ing judg­ment in which he dis­agreed with his col­leagues’ de­ci­sion and stat­ed that he would have grant­ed the in­junc­tion while Dho­ray’s sub­stan­tive case over the im­ple­men­ta­tion was be­ing ex­pe­di­tious­ly de­ter­mined.

Days lat­er, last Fri­day, the Court of Ap­peal grant­ed the PSA leave to pe­ti­tion the Privy Coun­cil.