Min­is­ter of So­cial De­vel­op­ment and Fam­i­ly Ser­vices (MS­DFS) Don­na Cox is con­cerned par­ents are not sup­port­ing their chil­dren men­tal­ly and emo­tion­al­ly. Speak­ing at City Hall in Port-of-Spain Wednes­day, Cox launched the Par­ent­ing Pro­gramme Work­shop. Cox said the work­shop was de­signed to sup­port and em­pow­er fam­i­lies across T&T. 

“The strength of our so­ci­ety lies in the strength of our fam­i­lies, so it is with­in our fam­i­lies that the foun­da­tion­al val­ues, skills and nur­tur­ing en­vi­ron­ment are cre­at­ed for our fu­ture gen­er­a­tions,” she said. 

Cox fur­ther ex­plained that the min­istry be­lieves that strength­en­ing fam­i­lies is cen­tral to ad­dress­ing some of the most press­ing chal­lenges the coun­try faces in so­ci­ety to­day. These is­sues are crime, pover­ty, do­mes­tic vi­o­lence and child abuse.

Min­is­ter Cox stressed the im­por­tance of par­ent­ing and the re­spon­si­bil­i­ty par­ents have in rais­ing the fu­ture of the coun­try. 

“To­day we re­flect on the vi­tal role that we as a so­ci­ety play in nur­tur­ing and safe­guard­ing our chil­dren’s fu­tures. We must reaf­firm our com­mit­ment, en­sur­ing that our chil­dren grow up in an en­vi­ron­ment that fos­ters love, safe­ty and, of course, op­por­tu­ni­ties. We are re­mind­ed of the im­mense re­spon­si­bil­i­ty we bear in shap­ing the lives of our fu­ture lead­ers,” she ex­plained. 

Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley had blamed poor par­ent­ing for a ‘sig­nif­i­cant por­tion of dif­fi­cul­ty’ in the coun­try. He made the com­ment back in 2022.

Row­ley al­so urged par­ents to step up and act with haste be­fore the time ran out.

Last year, Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice Er­la Hare­wood-Christo­pher al­so blamed bad par­ent­ing for con­tribut­ing to crime.

She said that every­thing starts at home, em­pha­sis­ing that parental short­com­ings of­ten shift the bur­den on­to law en­force­ment to ad­dress the re­sult­ing is­sues.  

Mean­while, the first com­mu­ni­ties to ben­e­fit from the par­ent­ing work­shop would be Ari­ma and Diego Mar­tin.

The work­shop will cov­er a range of top­ics that ad­dress the di­verse needs of par­ents and guardians, of­fer­ing both knowl­edge and prac­ti­cal strate­gies to help them nav­i­gate the chal­lenges of rais­ing chil­dren. Oth­er com­mu­ni­ties where the work­shop would be con­duct­ed are Bel­mont, Arou­ca, Cara­pichaima, Aranguez, El So­cor­ro and Pe­nal/Siparia. 

Chil­dren’s Au­thor­i­ty di­rec­tor Shel­don Cyrus and Com­mu­ni­ca­tions Min­is­ter Symon De No­bri­ga, who were al­so at the launch, both agreed with Cox that build­ing strong fam­i­lies is im­por­tant to cre­at­ing a safe, and healthy so­ci­ety.