Gail Alexan­der

Se­nior Po­lit­i­cal Re­porter

Among re­ports be­ing laid when Par­lia­ment re­sumes to­day is the Salaries Re­view Com­mis­sion’s 120th re­port, which re­views the SRC’s con­tro­ver­sial 117th re­port that the Gov­ern­ment had re­turned to the SRC to ad­dress anom­alies, in­clud­ing re­gard­ing the ju­di­cia­ry.

The House of Rep­re­sen­ta­tives has been on a break af­ter the Oc­to­ber de­bate on the 2025 bud­get. A bill to im­ple­ment bud­get plans be­gin­ning ahead is list­ed on to­day’s agen­da.

A mis­cel­la­neous pro­vi­sion bill is ex­pect­ed to be de­bat­ed first, which is ex­pect­ed to as­sist with T&T’s com­pli­ance with in­ter­na­tion­al treaties. The bill seeks to amend the Pro­ceeds of Crime, An­ti-Ter­ror­ism, Fi­nan­cial In­tel­li­gence Unit of Trinidad and To­ba­go, Se­cu­ri­ties, In­sur­ance, Non-Prof­it Or­gan­i­sa­tions, Civ­il As­set Re­cov­ery and Man­age­ment and Un­ex­plained Wealth and Mis­cel­la­neous Pro­vi­sions (FATF Com­pli­ance) bills.

There are al­so 15 Op­po­si­tion ques­tions con­cern­ing on­go­ing is­sues list­ed.

The SRC’s 120th Re­port is one of 22 re­ports list­ed for pre­sen­ta­tion. There are three re­ports from the SRC among the 22.

These are:

• The SRC’s 113th re­port on the Gen­er­al Re­view of Salaries and oth­er Terms and Con­di­tions of Ser­vice of Of­fices with­in the SRTC’s purview.

• The SRC’s 120th re­port re­view­ing the SRC’s 117th re­port with re­spect to the Re­view of Salaries and oth­er Terms and Con­di­tions of Ser­vice of Of­fices with­in the SRC’s purview.

• The SRC’s 119th re­port on the De­ter­mi­na­tion of Salary and oth­er terms and con­di­tions of ser­vice for the Of­fice of Deputy Di­rec­tor Gen­er­al—En­force­ment, En­force­ment Di­vi­sion of the T&T Rev­enue Au­thor­i­ty.

The 120th SRC re­port arose af­ter the 117th re­port—and its 113th re­port—were laid in Par­lia­ment in Feb­ru­ary.

The 113th re­port done in Oc­to­ber 2022 was a gen­er­al re­view of salaries and oth­er terms and con­di­tions of ser­vice of of­fi­cers with­in the SRC’s re­view.

The 117th re­port, com­plet­ed in May 2023, in­volved the SRC’s rec­om­men­da­tions fol­low­ing a job eval­u­a­tion ex­er­cise and com­pen­sa­tion sur­vey for around 300 po­si­tions in­volv­ing around 900 peo­ple.

In March, how­ev­er, Fi­nance Min­is­ter Colm Im­bert told Par­lia­ment that the SRC’s 117th re­port would be sent back to the SRC for re-ex­am­i­na­tion, re­view, and re­vi­sion. Im­bert cit­ed sev­er­al anom­alies that arose out of the job eval­u­a­tion ex­er­cise and com­pen­sa­tion sur­vey. 

This in­clud­ed the rec­om­men­da­tion that the salaries of judges of the Supreme Court be main­tained at the same lev­els as in the SRC’s last re­port. While pay hikes were pro­posed by the SRC for some of­fi­cials—in­clud­ing that the Prime Min­is­ter’s gross salary be high­er than any oth­er State of­fi­cial—the 117th re­port did not give judges any in­crease in their salaries and al­lowances. 

The SRC rec­om­mend­ed that the salaries of In­dus­tri­al Court judges be re­duced; and al­so rec­om­mend­ed a 60 per cent in­crease in the Op­po­si­tion Leader’s com­pen­sa­tion pack­age.

Chief Jus­tice Ivor Archie re­port­ed­ly took strong is­sue with the SRC’s rec­om­men­da­tions. Im­bert said the Gov­ern­ment had re­ceived fur­ther cor­re­spon­dence from the ju­di­cia­ry re­gard­ing the rec­om­men­da­tions for cer­tain of its se­nior ad­min­is­tra­tive of­fi­cers.

Im­bert al­so sub­se­quent­ly said he had not sug­gest­ed that the Gov­ern­ment had re­ject­ed the en­tire 117th SRC Re­port or all its rec­om­men­da­tions. He stressed the 117th Re­port was un­ac­cept­able be­cause of the se­ri­ous and in­ex­plic­a­ble anom­alies.”

The SRC was giv­en two months to re­view the re­port and ad­dress the anom­alies—fail­ing which, the Cab­i­net would make what­ev­er rec­om­men­da­tions it deemed ap­pro­pri­ate to the salaries to of­fice hold­ers—from the Pres­i­dent, Prime Min­is­ter, and MPS to Supreme Court judges and se­nior pub­lic ser­vants. The SRC’s role is ad­vi­so­ry and can be ac­cept­ed or re­ject­ed by the Cab­i­net and/or the Par­lia­ment or changed.

Anom­alies in the 117th SRC re­port:

* Salaries  for 16 key posts were  re­duced by as much as 15 per cent, while for a fur­ther 41 po­si­tions—in­clud­ing the  di­rec­tor of bud­gets, Cab­i­net’s sec­re­tary, the chief ed­u­ca­tion of­fi­cer, the comp­trol­ler of cus­toms  and the chief im­mi­gra­tion of­fi­cer—their rank­ing with­in the civ­il ser­vice or le­gal ser­vice was  low­ered. The Op­po­si­tion Leader’s salary  in­creased by 60 per cent. The salary of the Reg­is­trar of the In­dus­tri­al Court, an ad­min­is­tra­tive po­si­tion, would be high­er than that of an In­dus­tri­al Court judge.

*Al­so not­ed: The court ex­ec­u­tive ad­min­is­tra­tor, whose salary has in­creased by 30per cent, the reg­is­trar of the In­dus­tri­al Court, whose salary has in­creased by 29 per cent, the chair­man of a re­gion­al cor­po­ra­tion, whose salary has in­creased by 40 per cent and the chair­man of the Pub­lic Ser­vice Com­mis­sion, whose part-time salary has in­creased by 41per cent,  sev­er­al State coun­sels whose pack­age in­creased by 46 per cent.

How­ev­er new al­lowances rec­om­mend­ed in­clud­ed for the  Chief Per­son­nel Of­fi­cer, chief of de­fence staff, Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice and the Com­mis­sion­er of pris­ons, Per­ma­nent Sec­re­tary to the Prime Min­is­ter who will now get a ser­vice al­lowance.. The  clerk of the To­ba­go House of As­sem­bly and the clerk of the Sen­ate will now get a hous­ing al­lowance.