An­na-Lisa Paul

Se­nior Re­porter

an­na-lisa.paul@guardian.co.tt

Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice Al­lis­ter Gue­var­ro is de­fend­ing the Trinidad and To­ba­go Po­lice Ser­vice’s (TTPS) $800 mil­lion over­time bill as the ser­vice faces in­tense scruti­ny over pay­ments ac­crued dur­ing the three States of Emer­gency (SoEs) de­clared be­tween 2024 and 2026.

Con­tact­ed yes­ter­day on the is­sue, Gue­var­ro point­ed to what he de­scribed as the “dark side” of the de­mands placed on rank-and-file of­fi­cers. Ad­dress­ing the fig­ures re­port­ed by the TTPS Fi­nance Branch and Le­gal Unit, he said the over­time bill was noth­ing new.

“The TTPS over­time bill is no se­cret. It’s be­tween $400 mil­lion and $500 mil­lion an­nu­al­ly, and that’s with­out an SoE,” he said.

While ac­knowl­edg­ing the fig­ures are sub­stan­tial, he ar­gued they re­flect the re­al­i­ties of a po­lice ser­vice strug­gling with man­pow­er short­ages.

“The TTPS is short-staffed. How do peo­ple be­lieve we are able to main­tain a height­ened pres­ence?” he asked.

Gue­var­ro point­ed out that no First Di­vi­sion Of­fi­cer, in­clud­ing him­self as CoP, is en­ti­tled to or re­ceives over­time pay­ments.

“My hands are clean. I don’t get a cent of over­time mon­ey,” he said.

Of­fi­cers hold­ing the rank of as­sis­tant su­per­in­ten­dent of po­lice (ASP) and above are not el­i­gi­ble for over­time.

De­fend­ing of­fi­cers who rou­tine­ly work ex­tend­ed shifts, Gue­var­ro said the hu­man cost is of­ten over­looked.

“Work­ing ex­tra shifts and longer hours can re­sult in bro­ken homes, failed re­la­tion­ships and chil­dren grow­ing up with­out par­ents,” he said.

He al­so urged the pub­lic to re­frain from spread­ing “mis­in­for­ma­tion and false nar­ra­tives” that could dam­age the TTPS’s rep­u­ta­tion.

TTPS So­cial and Wel­fare As­so­ci­a­tion pres­i­dent ASP Ish­mael Pitt echoed those con­cerns, de­scrib­ing the or­gan­i­sa­tion as “woe­ful­ly un­der­strength” for years.

“A num­ber of of­fi­cers were be­ing asked to go way be­yond what you would have in an ide­al sit­u­a­tion,” Pitt said.

He praised of­fi­cers who stepped for­ward dur­ing the SoEs and said their sac­ri­fices played a crit­i­cal role in main­tain­ing pub­lic safe­ty.

“Had it not been for this type of ap­proach, we can well imag­ine what the crime front would have looked like,” he added.

Mean­while, for­mer com­mis­sion­er Gary Grif­fith has warned Home­land Se­cu­ri­ty Min­is­ter Roger Alexan­der against mak­ing what he de­scribed as in­ac­cu­rate claims about wastage, cor­rup­tion or the al­leged mis­ap­pro­pri­a­tion of funds dur­ing his tenure.

“Un­der my lead­er­ship, the TTPS re­duced over­time abuse and cor­rup­tion by over $100 mil­lion,” Grif­fith said.

“This was not a mi­nor ad­just­ment; it was a ma­jor in­ter­ven­tion in­to one of the most abused ar­eas with­in the Po­lice Ser­vice.”

Ex­plain­ing the ra­tio­nale be­hind the re­forms, Grif­fith claimed some of­fi­cers had been sub­mit­ting ex­ces­sive over­time claims that were rou­tine­ly ap­proved by se­nior of­fi­cers.

“Some of­fi­cers were al­leged­ly claim­ing to work 24 hours a day, 30 days a month, earn­ing tens of thou­sands of dol­lars in over­time, with those claims be­ing rou­tine­ly ap­proved by se­nior of­fi­cers,” Grif­fith claimed.

“That was the re­al wastage. That was where tax­pay­ers’ mon­ey was be­ing drained. And I dealt with it.”

He said the re­duc­tion in over­time spend­ing was achieved while po­lice vis­i­bil­i­ty across the coun­try near­ly dou­bled.

“This was not mere­ly my per­son­al claim. It was recog­nised in my an­nu­al re­port, where spe­cial com­men­da­tion was made by the Po­lice Ser­vice Com­mis­sion for re­duc­ing over­time ex­pen­di­ture by ap­prox­i­mate­ly $100 mil­lion while in­creas­ing po­lice vis­i­bil­i­ty and op­er­a­tional pres­ence.”

Ac­cord­ing to Grif­fith, those sav­ings helped fund a range of ini­tia­tives and ac­qui­si­tions with­out re­quir­ing ad­di­tion­al state fund­ing. These in­clud­ed body cam­eras, tasers, pep­per spray, GPS track­ing sys­tems for po­lice ve­hi­cles, the Gen­der-Based Vi­o­lence Unit, the So­cial Me­dia Mon­i­tor­ing Unit, en­hanced dark-web in­ves­tiga­tive ca­pa­bil­i­ties, kid­nap­ping re­sponse tech­nol­o­gy and the es­tab­lish­ment of the Po­lice Ma­rine Branch.

Grif­fith al­so took aim at Alexan­der’s cur­rent an­ti-crime strat­e­gy.

“In com­par­i­son, the present an­ti-crime plan un­der Alexan­der’s watch ap­pears to be SoE, SoE and more SoE,” he said.

He chal­lenged Alexan­der to ex­plain why over­time costs had risen af­ter pre­vi­ous­ly be­ing re­duced un­der his ad­min­is­tra­tion.

“Un­der Alexan­der’s watch, not on­ly has that $100 mil­lion cost re­turned, but he is now re­quest­ing a fur­ther $100 mil­lion. That amounts to a mas­sive $200 mil­lion swing. That is not re­form. That is re­gres­sion,” Grif­fith said.

“So in­stead of mak­ing reck­less and mis­lead­ing state­ments about my tenure, Min­is­ter Alexan­der needs to ex­plain to the me­dia and the peo­ple of Trinidad and To­ba­go why the ex­act over­time abuse that was brought un­der con­trol is now be­ing al­lowed to re­turn, with ex­tras.”