Carrie-Ann Moreau, who claimed to have been sexually harassed by Minister of Sport and Youth Affairs Darryl Smith, did not sue Smith but sued the State (the Ministry of Sport and Youth Affairs and the Chief Personnel Officer) for TT$234,360. Similarly, Bernadette Sammy, who claimed to have been sexually harassed …
Read More »Living Law (Pt 2): The rule of law and the ordinary citizen; professor shares guiding principles
The rule of law is an abstract concept but that does not mean it is difficult to understand. Here goes: Let us suppose the government passed a law to empower the police to come into your house and take all your money away and freeze all your bank accounts? How …
Read More »Living Law: The paradox of the ‘rule of law’ and why no one quite gets it right
The idea of the rule of law is very old; it has been traced way back to the time of Aristotle (384 – 322 BC), who wrote that it was “better for the law to rule than one of the citizens […] so that even the guardians of the law …
Read More »Living Law: CoP vs DSD & Anor; why La Brea massacre victims can have their own ‘Pratt and Morgan’
If you are wondering why, as a Trinidad and Tobago citizen, I choose to highlight the case of Commissioner of Police of the Metropolis v DSD & Anor [2018] UKSC 11 (DSD) coming out of the United Kingdom, the reason is simple. This case has basically turned the concept of …
Read More »Dear Editor: That’s rubbish! How emotion rules and facts get short shrift in T&T
“A Chief Justice… ‘with a pattern of breaking rules.’ Like a Rott on a roti, a lot of people, I expect, will jump on that phrase. Why? Well, about half will merely see another example of a successful black man being persecuted. Not all 50% but a substantial proportion of that …
Read More »Dear Editor: Anti-Gang Bill no panacea for crime; change of culture of Police Service needed
“The Anti-Gang Bill, sunset clause or not, suffers from the same ills as every other piece of legislation in Trinidad and Tobago: to be effective, it must be enforced! For enforcement to take place, the Police Service needs to do a better job, a much, much better job. To ascertain …
Read More »Dear Editor: Outdated laws are cause of sexual harassment problem; T&T must move women into 21st Century
“Trinidad and Tobago has very antiquated laws, some dating all the way back to the 18th Century; the main laws dealing with offences to the person date back to 1925 and have remained more or less untouched since then. To understand why this is so, we must go back to …
Read More »Dear Editor: Pratt and Morgan rubbish? Let’s recognise legal limits of landmark ruling
“This does not mean that hanging cannot take place; it merely means that the entire judicial process needs to take place and be completed within five years. So, it is rather disingenuous of Mr Ragoo to blame the ‘foreign architects’ (Privy Council judges) for the incompetence demonstrated by successive governments. It is …
Read More »Dear Editor: Imbert and the PNM are in charge; let’s see them trying to solve the problems
“The question is whether any government has the political willpower to effect the necessary changes to make the Police Service efficient. I am not optimistic about an answer in the affirmative because the scale of systemic neglect extends to the health services and social care as well as environmental management and …
Read More »Dear Editor: What’s TTPS’ plan, Mr CoP, for pulling back runaway murder and crime?
“If the current average rate of about two per day is sustained, by the end of the year, we can expect there will be some 700 homicides (aka murders). (But) that sort of figure is plainly ridiculous, outrageous for a country with only some 1.3 million people.” The following Letter …
Read More »Dear Editor: T&T’s culture trap; are shortcuts and lame ducks with us to stay?
“In Trinidad and Tobago, it is almost a cultural reflex to take the easiest and shortest route. It is the cultural reason why we fail, as a people, to make any progress. “[…] Which is why the PSC made the glaring error that people external to themselves can see but …
Read More »Dear Editor: The case of Gafoor’s chauffeur allowance has been badly misconstrued
“The matter referred to concerns the chauffeur’s allowance granted to the learned judge in her capacity as a judge. The High Court found as a fact that the allowance claimed arose as a matter of personal entitlement. “Up to that point in time, there had remained a question as to …
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