Gail Alexan­der

To­ba­go East MP Ver­nel­la Al­leyne-Top­pin will not face dis­ci­pli­nary ac­tion by the Par­lia­ment, House Speak­er Wade Mark has ruled.

In a state­ment in Par­lia­ment yes­ter­day, Mark, while de­scrib­ing her re­cent con­tro­ver­sial re­marks about Op­po­si­tion Peo­ple's Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM) leader Dr Kei­th Row­ley as un­for­tu­nate and un­par­lia­men­tary, said, "I have giv­en care­ful con­sid­er­a­tion to this mat­ter, the rel­e­vant prac­tice re­ferred to and find that giv­en all the cir­cum­stances, a pri­ma fa­cie case does not ex­ist.

"It is al­so the opin­ion of this Chair that it would in­deed be be­neath the dig­ni­ty of this House to have this mat­ter in­ves­ti­gat­ed by the Com­mit­tee of Priv­i­leges, in light of the MP's (Al­leyne-Top­pin) pub­lic apol­o­gy."

Mark's rul­ing was in re­sponse to a mo­tion by In­de­pen­dent Lib­er­al Par­ty MP Jack Warn­er, who called for the House to send Al­leyne-Top­pin be­fore the Priv­i­leges Com­mit­tee to de­cide on dis­ci­pli­nary ac­tion fol­low­ing her March 25 re­marks about Row­ley. She al­leged he was a child of rape and al­so raised ques­tions about the fa­ther­ing of a child via al­leged rape. This elicit­ed con­dem­na­tion from some quar­ters of the pub­lic.

Warn­er claimed Al­leyne-Top­pin had com­mit­ted con­tempt of the House, abused the priv­i­lege of free­dom of speech and brought the House in­to ridicule and dis­re­pute.

Yes­ter­day, Mark said mem­bers should be care­ful not to abuse free­dom of speech in the House.

"In ex­er­cis­ing this con­sti­tu­tion­al right, the in­di­vid­ual mem­ber must be con­scious of the im­por­tance for him or her to be trust­wor­thy. It is the mem­ber who ul­ti­mate­ly will be judged by an in­creas­ing­ly crit­i­cal pub­lic," he said.

He said par­lia­men­tary priv­i­lege car­ries with it re­spon­si­bil­i­ties as well as rights, "and those re­spon­si­bil­i­ties ought to be ex­er­cised not on­ly with­in the rules laid down by the House but in con­for­mi­ty with the stan­dards this House ex­pects of its mem­bers."

Mark said ir­re­spon­si­ble or reck­less use of the priv­i­lege of free speech in the House "can be prej­u­di­cial to the na­tion­al in­ter­est, in­jure per­sons who have no re­course with­in this House and tar­nish the dig­ni­ty of all ho­n­ourable mem­bers as well as this House it­self.

"In­deed, the reck­less use of this right can di­min­ish the val­ue of the right to this House col­lec­tive­ly and to mem­bers in­di­vid­u­al­ly. It is al­so be­yond doubt that all ho­n­ourable mem­bers will fur­ther agree that the strongest safe­guard against abuse is the self-dis­ci­pline of in­di­vid­ual mem­bers."

Pub­lic con­dem­na­tion

Mark said Al­leyne-Top­pin ut­tered re­marks which have sub­se­quent­ly re­ceived vo­cif­er­ous con­dem­na­tion in the pub­lic do­main.

He ad­mit­ted that some of those re­marks were in­deed un­for­tu­nate and un­par­lia­men­tary.

"The strong con­dem­na­tion of these re­marks pub­lished in the me­dia has been re­gard­ed by the Speak­er as re­flec­tions on this House and its mem­bers," he said.

"The mem­ber for To­ba­go East may have been ad­judged guilty of con­tempt by those per­sons in the pub­lic do­main who have cho­sen to voice their opin­ions. How­ev­er, it is this House, and on­ly this House, that is em­pow­ered to de­ter­mine whether the mem­ber for To­ba­go East com­mit­ted a breach of priv­i­lege by way of con­tempt. I (have) not­ed the mem­ber apol­o­gised to this House on Wednes­day, April 8...and not­ed the mem­ber of­fered this apol­o­gy at the very first op­por­tu­ni­ty to so do."

He said in Aus­tralia, the Unit­ed King­dom, Cana­da and In­dia, it was well-es­tab­lished par­lia­men­tary prac­tice that the House might en­force the ob­ser­vance of its priv­i­leges by re­quest­ing an apol­o­gy.

"In Aus­tralia, al­though the House may con­sid­er that a breach of priv­i­lege or a con­tempt has been com­mit­ted, it may take no fur­ther ac­tion or it may de­cide, hav­ing re­gard to the cir­cum­stances of the case, to 'con­sult its own dig­ni­ty' by tak­ing no puni­tive ac­tion.

"Sim­i­lar­ly, in In­dia, when the of­fend­er ten­ders an apol­o­gy, the House gen­er­al­ly doesn't pro­ceed with the mat­ter, whether or not the House/Priv­i­leges Com­mit­tee has come to the de­ci­sion that a breach of priv­i­lege or con­tempt of the House has been com­mit­ted," he said.