00:17Underachievement and at-risk students, that's linked to poverty.
00:20So what you're telling poor students going to school is that they have no chance because
00:26there's no student support services to help you and the Prime Minister's stance is, well,
00:31just send them home to misbehaving.
00:33What are we really saying?
00:35That there's no social mobilization to achieve in this country?
00:40That if you're poor and you're troubled, then you are just resigned to failure in the education
00:45system in Trinidad and Tobago?
00:54There are hundreds of student support services staff who are at home without contracts, school
01:01safety officers, guidance counselors, diagnostic specialists, special education officers.
01:07These are critical staff who are doing the work to support teachers, support parents, and
01:14help vulnerable students.
01:15These are young citizens.
01:17Are we to discard them?
01:18What are the legal instincts of the federal government that the prime minister knows that?
01:24Does the federal government look like to be taken?
01:24What is the legal instinct that the federal government to put into the federal government
01:26and then to help them out?
01:30So it's absolutely foolish and the prime minister knows that.
01:33it's really just a way to try again to distract from
01:37the original ridiculous statement that she made
01:41the government has a responsibility
01:44to assist students who have
01:47problems with behavioral transformation
01:51in that they cannot behave properly
01:54you send them to school, you try to help them, it's not working
01:58then what does government do? And it can't be
02:01simply, well just send them home. Many of the children, who you send them home to?
02:06Many of them, you'd be surprised how many children parent themselves
02:19When students had to be removed from the mainstream school system
02:23we formed partnerships with Servall and Milat
02:26and we sent children there, not home
02:28we send them to Servall, we send them to Milat
02:32so that they can have a chance at behavioral transformation
02:35that is how a government deals
02:37with young people who need help
02:45There's no one in this country who can say
02:47parents have no responsibility
02:49However, what happens when a parent drops the ball?
02:52And that is the question
02:54Do we continue saying, is it your fault, is it your fault, is it your fault?
02:59At that point, what is the state's responsibility?
03:01Because if the state continues to say, well the parents are not doing it, well nobody doing
03:06it, then we still end up dealing with the problem later on
03:17I challenge the Ministry of Education, the Minister of Education, Minister Dowlaff, I challenge you today to stand as I
03:25am and elucidate what is your plan and your program for young people, for those who need help, for behavioral
03:32transformation, what is your plan?
03:34And I challenge you today to stand and speak and account to the people who elected you
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