Padarath: House sitting will be 'hot and heavy'

HOUSE Leader Barry Padarath foresees a "hot and heavy" sitting of the House of Representatives on its first working day under the Kamla Persad-Bissessar government on June 13 which starts at 1.30 pm.

The House convenes under Speaker Jagdeo Singh. Padarath is Leader of Government Business while Arouca/Lopinot MP Marvin Gonzales is Opposition Chief Whip under Leader of the Opposition Pennelope Beckles.

The order paper, sent out on June 11, indicated 59 papers to be laid by government ministers, two bills to be debated – the Children's Life Fund (Amendment) Bill 2025 and TT Revenue Authority (Repeal) Bill 2025 – plus two government motions to name a new Commissioner of Police (CoP) and a new acting Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCP).

The Parliament website suggested the papers would be laid, the two bills briefly introduced, the police nominees debated, and then the two bills fully debated.

The bills respectively expand the scope of Children's Life Fund Act and repeal the TTRA act. The papers to be laid include the Public Accounts of TT (2024) and its Auditor General Report.

Padarath, who is Couva South MP, on June 11 told Newsday he wanted the House to take both bills through all their stages on June 13.

Padarath said for ten years the UNC had urged the PNM to expand the Children's Life Fund Act to help a wider category of children.

He said a child had died in San Fernando while awaiting a legal opinion as to entitlement to medical funding.

"It was brought to our attention that legislation – which is a living, breathing thing – requires us to review it from time to time. Despite all our cries and all the pleas, the former administration refused to amend the Children's Life Fund Act."

He said it was Persad-Bissessar's vision to review the act and she had mandated a cabinet committee to do so.

"We completed that about a week or two ago. Some work is still being done on it.

"We feel we are in a comfortable position that the most vulnerable people in our society – who are our nation's children – should be placed as the top priority of this incoming administration.

"I don't think it is a surprise to anyone in this nation that children have always been the prime minister's priority – whether it is laptops, places in secondary school, or whether it is under the Children's Life Fund. Therefore the very first bill under the Kamla Persad-Bissessar administration in the second term will be the Children's Life Fund Bill. We are taking it through its entirety."

Padarath said the government has also examined an alleged lack of financing and staffing to properly run the fund.

"So it is not simply passing a piece of legislation. Mrs Persad-Bissessar is intent that once the legislation is amended on Friday, these amendments will be brought into effect in a short order."

This would help children whose applications are before the fund, he said.

"I will give you an example. Over the past ten years Mrs Persad-Bissessar used to send me to assist parents who were being refused funding from the Children's Life Fund, who would not even allow them to put in an application.

The Children's Life Fund used to be staffed by one OJT (on the-job-trainee) who would determine whether the people could get a form to apply or not. We will put an end to those things."

He said the government wanted to let the health minister review a denial of a request. "So it is a lot of good things. It is not just allowing one category of children to apply."

Padarath lamented the cases of a blood disease, Beta Thalassemia, which kills children ten years after its onset.

"So they could survive a few years but the ultimate destination is death."

He said the fund was Persad-Bissessar's "brain-child and legacy" in 2010, and now a 2025 campaign promise.

"It is something we are now going to deliver, as our very first act as legislators in this new parliament, to bring relief to the most vulnerable, our nation's children."

Padarath: TTRA Act 'unworkable'

Padarath said the second bill on June 13 would be that to repeal the TTRA Act, an issue the UNC had just campaigned heavily on.

He said the PSA had raised concerns in recent years on the act, and the UNC was quite aware of the challenges in the proposed revenue authority.

"We vehemently opposed the TTRA. We felt it gave the (finance) minister too much power, in that he should not have any sort of involvement in accessing the personal information of taxpayers."

"We thought it was unworkable. We thought it was anti-worker."

He said the UNC also disliked how top post-holders in the Board of Inland Revenue (BIR) were appointed.

"After rescinding the TTRA, which will come on Friday, there are ways in which we will strengthen the BIR, to give it a bit more teeth in terms of revenue collection but also workers protection."

Padarath looked forward to the dozens of papers to be laid, many of which were financial reports.

"It will give us a clearer snapshot of how some of these state companies, state enterprises were run, some of the things that were flagged over these years."

Of the expected Public Accounts, he said, "I want the public to stay tuned and pay close attention to the Auditor General's Report with respect to the waste, mismanagement and corruption of the former administration. A lot of details are provided in that report.

"Usually the government is held to account but on this occasion the opposition will be held to account, because we just came in."

Saying any items flagged by the Auditor General had taken place under the former regime, he said Beckles and her colleagues could not now separate themselves from that administration in which they were senior ministers.

Padarath said on June, the tables would turn.

"So on the resumption of Parliament under a new administration, it will be hot, it will be heavy.

"We will be coming at the opposition firing on all cylinders, holding them to account, for the billions they have spent without and real, tangible results in terms of changing the quality of life for the people of TT."

Regarding the choice of a new CoP and an Acting DCP, he said, "Within the next couple of days we will advise on how the government intends to proceed with those matters.

"There is an administrative part of it in terms of how it is to be treated with. So we will signal our intent over the next couple of days."