00:00Opposition leader Penelope Beckles-Robinson says they are waiting to see exactly how the government plans to deal with the demerit point system.
00:08Upon taking office, Prime Minister Kamala Passat-Bissessa said her government would be moving to scrap it.
00:14The opposition leader addressed this in a press conference following the ceremonial opening of Parliament this afternoon.
00:22Well, our position definitely is not to scrap it in totality.
00:26I mean, we would like to know exactly what they mean when they say to remove the demerit points.
00:32I mean, we have heard the public. Some people have complained that they do feel that it's too, you know, it's too penal.
00:38So, but we want to know exactly what do they mean by that.
00:42If you look at most countries in the world, they do have a demerit system.
00:45And a lot of it is linked to insurance, to your driver's permit.
00:49She says the objective of the demerit point system is to protect law-abiding citizens from the delinquent drivers that exist on the nation's roads.
00:59People are killed regularly in Trinidad and Tobago.
01:03So, it's not just a question that this government just wanted to put in place a system where you don't care.
01:09But you have to look at the fact that people really have developed, you know, almost, in a sense, an indifference to some of the road users.
01:19The position leader also took the time to address other pieces of legislation the government has hinted at bringing to parliaments.
01:26There are two pieces of legislation they spoke about, which was the revenue authority, if I recall correctly, as well as the standalone legislation.
01:36Those are two pieces of legislation that they made specific stand-your-ground legislation.
01:41But the truth is we haven't seen it.
01:43I mean, you know, to say that you're simply not going to support something that you didn't see, I mean, the concept, because we know that crime is a very sensitive issue.
01:52We know that the public is awaiting to see whether you're going to support legislation that deals with crime.
01:58And in my speech today, I did say that we will support good legislation.
02:02Former Finance Minister Kalmenberg says the $135 million collected by the PNM government for property tax is not missing.
02:11He was responding to reporters following the opening of Parliament today.
02:15The Prime Minister said recently that the PNM spent that money and they needed to account to the public for it.
02:24The money went into the Consolidated Fund. That's public knowledge.
02:30It was not collected by the local government corporations.
02:34The way the system was designed, the money would go into the Consolidated Fund.
02:40And you look at the budget estimates, you will see that.
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