According to the late Patrick Manning: “This country owes a debt of gratitude on this matter to Sir Ellis Clarke and the team of technocrats whom he led from T&T, the region, and the United Kingdom. It was a dedicated group of technocrats who sat for long hours and hammered out an arrangement which this evening was the subject of approval of hon members. I thank and congratulate my honourable colleagues opposite for sitting with us and arriving at modifications to the initial proposals that could meet with the approbation of hon members on both sides. It is a historic day and while we would not expect that there would be a change in the crime situation tomorrow, what this certainly does, it sets the stage for better arrangements in the future and a police service in which the national community can have more confidence and levels of crime that would be more consistent with the national aspirations of the people of T&T. Permit me also to thank hon members on this side, my colleagues for having been so patient in this matter and lending their support to this historic legislation.” (Hansard, House of Representatives, March 27, 2006, p. 114).
In reply to this appreciation of support, Opposition MP Kamla Persad-Bissessar said:
“We thank those on the other side and our side for some very novel and innovative ideas that have come forward…However, whilst we record that we have completed; done a lot of work and all those who have assisted, at the end of the day, it is the implementation. It would not be easy. I ask the hon Prime Minister to put a dedicated committee in place to oversee the implementation. If it sits there it is not going to happen. The Police Service and the commissioner are very busy. For this to work it is the implementation. I request respectfully, that a dedicated committee be set up for implementation of the legislation.” (Hansard, House of Representatives, March 27, 2006, pp. 114-115).
Both Manning and Persad-Bissessar were right. The enactment of this package of legislation (Constitutional Amendment, Police Service Bill and Police Complaints Authority Bill) was regarded as a landmark occasion to bring about fundamental change to the Police Service.
However, Persad-Bissessar envisaged the need to oversee the implementation of the legislation. That is exactly the fault line that has appeared. The pre-parliamentary process was exposed in this round of implementation insofar as the process was described by the Government as being “flawed”, while the Opposition did not subscribe to that view.
Today most of the challenges of implementation have come home to roost. The pre-parliamentary process had its challenges with the issue of talent pooling of people who did not apply for the job of commissioner being advanced for the job. Secondly, the discrepancy that has arisen between the Salaries Review Commission salary for a commissioner from inside the service and the contract negotiations for a commissioner from outside the service. Thirdly, the leak of the interview process that revealed that Gary Griffith did not emerge on top the interview list certainly hit him a political blow before he even got started on the job.
Section 7 of the bill that amended the Constitution to remove the Police Service Commission from the day-to-day operations of the Police Service has not had the kind of implementation yet that the legislation envisaged based on the recent Manpower Audit Report.
According to that section:
“123A. (1) Subject to section 123(1), the Commissioner of Police shall have the complete power to manage the Police Service and is required to ensure that the human, financial, and material resources available to the service are used in an efficient and effective manner.”
The Police Service Commission was replaced by the Commissioner of Police in exercising the functions of appointment, promotion, confirmation, transfer, and discipline of all officers except the Commissioner and Deputy Commissioners of Police since 2006.
What Parliament did in 2006 was to remove the prime ministerial veto, replace secrecy with transparency, replace the Police Service Commission with the Commissioner of Police for everyday operations, and make the appointment of a Commissioner of Police subject to a professional search by the PSC and political endorsement by the elected representatives.
The problematic fallout, so far, is the resistance of the existing administrative and political cultures to accept this transition.