A Cab­i­net sub-com­mit­tee met with mem­bers of the Scrap Iron Deal­ers As­so­ci­a­tion Ex­ec­u­tive to­day to dis­cuss the plagu­ing is­sue of theft re­lat­ing to the scrap iron in­dus­try. The com­mit­tee con­sist­ed of Chair­man Min­is­ter of En­er­gy Stu­art R Young, At­tor­ney Gen­era Regi­nald Ar­mour S.C, Min­is­ter of Trade and In­dus­try, Paula Gopee-Scoon and the Min­is­ter of Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty Fitzger­ald Hinds MP. 

Pres­i­dent of the Scrap Iron Deal­ers As­so­ci­a­tion Mr. Al­lan Fer­gu­son pre­sent­ed the Com­mit­tee with a pro­pos­al of tem­po­rary mea­sures to ad­dress the theft of scrap met­als. The Gov­ern­ment stat­ed that ur­gent ac­tion is need­ed to ad­dress the crim­i­nal­i­ty and crim­i­nal el­e­ments plagu­ing the sec­tor as the in­creased lev­els of wan­ton theft are pre­sent­ing se­ri­ous na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty risks. 

The com­mit­tee in­di­cat­ed the gov­ern­ment’s will­ing­ness to con­tin­ue work­ing with the As­so­ci­a­tion on the de­vel­op­ment and im­ple­men­ta­tion of re­vised reg­u­la­tions and poli­cies to reg­u­late the in­dus­try and ad­dress the crim­i­nal ac­tiv­i­ty tak­ing place. 

How­ev­er, it was em­pha­sized that ur­gent ac­tion is re­quired to ad­dress the ex­ist­ing sit­u­a­tion and that the gov­ern­ment will take the ap­pro­pri­ate ur­gent ac­tion to ar­rest the prob­lems as­so­ci­at­ed with the wide­spread theft of met­al items tak­ing place through­out Trinidad and To­ba­go.