Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty Min­is­ter and Laven­tille West MP Fitzger­ald Hinds yes­ter­day de­fend­ed the per­for­mance of the Of­fice of Dis­as­ter Pre­pared­ness Man­age­ment (ODPM) amid this week’s heavy rains and flood­ing, af­ter Op­po­si­tion MP for Barataria/San Juan Sad­dam Ho­sein said the ODPM wasn’t pre­pared for the re­cent dis­as­ter.

Both faced off dur­ing yes­ter­day’s Stand­ing Fi­nance Com­mit­tee meet­ing in Par­lia­ment to ex­am­ine the Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty’s $2.2 bil­lion al­lo­ca­tion for 2023.

Ho­sein said pri­vate cit­i­zens had to en­gage in res­cue op­er­a­tions when the ODPM was al­lo­cat­ed $16.5 mil­lion.

“And we’re not re­al­ly see­ing the ODPM do­ing any­thing in this coun­try,” Ho­sein said.

Hinds re­spond­ed, “The events over the last 24 hours (rain) would ob­vi­ous­ly have been af­ter these al­lo­ca­tion fig­ures were set­tled. Sec­ond­ly, I’ve seen no dis­as­ter any­where in the world where peo­ple in a com­mu­ni­ty didn’t ral­ly, con­tribute and sup­port in the way hu­man be­ings do.”

Hinds said he hadn’t heard from ODPM’s lead­ers any ques­tion of any short­age of funds or un­avail­abil­i­ty of re­sources. He there­fore felt ODPM’s al­lo­ca­tion is ad­e­quate and “as al­ways,” if more was need­ed, ad­just­ments could be done.

Ho­sein added, “Min­is­ter, we’re re­al­ly not sat­is­fied with the ODPM’s per­for­mance, es­pe­cial­ly in the last 24 hours. The or­gan­i­sa­tion’s name dic­tates what it should do and I re­al­ly think the ODPM wasn’t pre­pared for this par­tic­u­lar dis­as­ter.

“They’ve been al­lo­cat­ed $18 mil­lion the last fis­cal year and you al­lo­cate an­oth­er $16.5 mil­lion the up­com­ing year. I re­al­ly hope you look in­to what’s hap­pen­ing with the ODPM, as it’s fall­en down on its face in T&T be­cause we have pri­vate cit­i­zens who are try­ing to re­cov­er and res­cue peo­ple who are ma­rooned be­cause of flood­ing.”

Hinds replied, “If what you said was re­mote­ly true, then mon­ey wouldn’t have been the is­sue. But the ODPM is a co-or­di­nat­ing agency and it is one of the most ef­fi­cient as a co-or­di­nat­ing agency in this coun­try—it does its busi­ness.”

Asked by Cou­va North MP Ravi Rati­ram about al­lo­ca­tion re­duc­tion ($2 mil­lion to $600,000) for the Na­tion­al Crime Pre­ven­tion Pro­gramme, Hinds said all ac­tiv­i­ties are be­ing re­viewed in the con­text of the pol­i­cy of view­ing crime as a pub­lic health is­sue and more would be said lat­er.

Rati­ram was an­gry at a $1.3 mil­lion re­duc­tion con­cern­ing Coast Guard fu­el, as he said fish­er­men were be­ing at­tacked and killed and their safe­ty is need­ed. Hinds said the re­duc­tion didn’t mean less CG pres­ence, since fu­el will be pro­vid­ed to the CG as it’s pro­vid­ed now.

Rati­ram was al­so up­set about a De­fence Force $8.5 mil­lion food al­lo­ca­tion (in­creased by $500,000) while their ve­hi­cle al­lo­ca­tion was re­duced by $1.5 mil­lion. Rati­ram felt they should have more ve­hi­cle al­lo­ca­tion to per­form du­ties and “not sid­dong in the of­fice and eat food.”

Hinds said ra­tions for a mil­i­tary unit was as im­por­tant, as mo­bil­i­ty and al­lo­ca­tion will man­age TTDF’s work and if more was need­ed it would be al­lo­cat­ed.

Hinds said there are 4,219 posts for prison of­fi­cers and 3,821 are filled with 313 with “live bod­ies” and 85 with­out. Re­cruit­ment of 250 of­fi­cers was done this year and is on­go­ing. Hinds said prison of­fi­cers’ over­time—which was high­er dur­ing the pan­dem­ic when of­fi­cers were on quar­an­tine—would drop as the COVID-19 threat re­cedes. He as­sured more fund­ing for equip­ment—in­clud­ing stab-proof vests—would be ob­tained if more than the 2023 al­lo­ca­tion was need­ed.

Short­age of Im­mi­gra­tion of­fi­cers—where there are 148 va­can­cies—is be­ing man­aged by the Pub­lic Ser­vice Com­mis­sion, he said.