Last Tuesday, a group of about 140 Tobagonian men, women, boys and girls boarded a British Airways aircraft at the ANR Robinson International Airport bound for London and then on to Manchester, the city in England made famous by its two football clubs, Manchester United and Manchester City.
Appropriately, the group, who travelled to Britain under the umbrella of the Jaric Titans Sports and Development Club, was heading to north-west England to participate in a football tournament, the Manchester Easter International Cup.
The event, which took place last weekend, attracted three teams from T&T.
This football tournament in Manchester would not have attracted national attention if the organisers of the trip, Jaric Titans, had made proper arrangements for their young charges. It is clear that the organisers did not.
It seems they collected enough money to pay for the airline tickets, but made no arrangements to raise funds to cover the entire cost of travel to and from the tournament, food, accommodation, cold-weather clothing and incidentals.
The proof that the funding for this trip was totally inadequate comes from the establishment of a GoFundMe account in the name of Jaric Titans Sports Development Club, which proposes to raise £60,000 (TT$540,000) "to cover their travel, food and accommodation costs while in Manchester, UK".
Up to last night, some £6,685 of the £60,000 had been raised on the crowdfunding platform, which is 11.14 per cent of the target.
It is quite likely that with over £53,000 (TT$477,000) still to be raised, the Jaric Titans Sports Development Club will be looking to the Tobago House of Assembly (THA) or the Central Government to provide the balance of the funds for what even Minister of Sport and Community Development Shamfa Cudjoe-Lewis described as a joyride.
It is, of course, an act of gross irresponsibility for anyone to embark on a foreign trip without having a very clear idea of how basics such as food, transport and accommodation are going to be funded.
But for a group to expose dozens of children between the ages of three and 16 to even the remote possibility of being left to fend for themselves in bitterly cold Manchester is reckless conduct, beyond belief, that may even amount to child endangerment or abuse.
What would be the position of the organisers of this trip if one or more of the children developed a serious illness, which required hospitalisation, as a result of being exposed to temperatures that most of them would never have experienced?
Unfortunately, this is not the first time that something like this has happened to a group of Tobagonians. In September 2022, some 27 members of the Roxborough Folk Performers group who went to New York on a cultural tour were left to fend for themselves without accommodation or meals. They too had to be bailed out by the THA.
Exposing children to that possibility is much, much worse.
It goes without saying, therefore, that it would be an unimaginable insult to every tax-paying citizen of T&T for either the THA or the Government to advance one cent to the organisers of this folly. They must accept responsibility for funding the balance between what the GoFundMe account eventually raises and what is owed. Furthermore, any money advanced by the state in what became an emergency situation should be refunded, as anything less will simply be encouraging more people to do the same.