Ex-Speaker: Ameen must respect Annisette-George

FORMER Speaker Barendra “Barry” Sinanan has said St Augustine MP Khadijah Ameen had gone too far in recent posts on social media which alleged unequal treatment from Speaker Bridgid Annisette-George.

Suggesting government MPs should also have been reined in, just like opposition MPs, during cross-bench banter in a recent sitting, Ameen had posted, "Like is only the Opposition involved in crosstalk?”

In last Friday’s sitting, Leader of Government Business Camille Robinson-Regis reported the issue to the Speaker and threatened Ameen with a motion of privilege.

Sinanan was Speaker from 2002-2010 and PNM MP for San Fernando West from 1995-2000.

He told Newsday on Tuesday that MPs should show dignity, and respect the chair.

“Whilst standing orders don’t cover that, at the same time one has to behave in a manner that doesn’t bring the House into disrepute. So you have to behave in a dignified manner.

“You will probably have to go and amend the standing orders again. There’s a standing orders committee, so that’s where we want to go.”

Sinanan said if matters were not in the standing orders, one could look to the UK Parliament for guidance, including its willingness to amend its standing orders.

Newsday asked if it was simply a basic convention of Parliament that the Speaker commands respect, whether or not this principle was written into law.

“That’s when you’re dealing with a mature Parliament. If you have mature parliamentarians – and I mean mature in every sense of the word – then you shouldn’t have that problem,” Sinanan said. “But when you have an immature Parliament, partly or wholly, then you run into problems. Then your last resort is to legislate, that is, amend the standing orders.”

Sinanan said it should not have come to that.

“This thing about ‘newbies’ and so on, I don’t buy that. You are in politics for either a long time, as the member has been (Ameen is a former senator), or even if you are new to politics, you have seniors. Go and ask some advice! But they don’t do that.

“You can’t legislate for everything. This is why you have to depend on people’s sense of maturity and their own sense of what is right and what is wrong.”

Asked if any MP could post online a running commentary about a parliamentary sitting while in session, Sinanan again said, “One has to be mature.” He recalled the incident where as Speaker he had said MPs could seek his nod to use their electronic devices during sittings, but one MP had used his device without getting permission, a reference to an incident involving former opposition leader Basdeo Panday.

A parliamentary official told Newsday the Speaker should only be discussed by way of a substantive motion, including possibly a no-confidence motion. Further, no allegations should be made against her without supporting evidence.

Unsure of any written rules against bringing the chair into disrepute, he simply said, “Certain things, in practice you just don’t do.”