The Law Association of Trinidad and Tobago (LATT) is calling for urgent constitutional reform, particularly the removal of the savings law clause. The Court of Appeal's decision in Attorney General v Jason Jones found that sections of the Sexual Offences Act, which criminalise buggery and gross indecency, infringe upon fundamental rights.
However, the majority of the Court ruled that these laws remain valid because they were inherited from the colonial era and are protected by the savings law clause. This clause prevents certain pre-independence laws from being declared unconstitutional, even if they violate modern human rights standards.
LATT argued that this legal shield is outdated and incompatible with contemporary democratic principles. The Association said in a release that similar clauses have been removed or reinterpreted in other Caribbean nations without negative consequences. “The removal of the savings law clause will not have catastrophic consequences,” LATT said, pointing out that in places like Barbados and Guyana, such clauses are “read to conform with the Constitution.”
The association also said the clause preserves outdated colonial laws that no longer belong in a modern democracy. These include laws criminalising sedition, loitering, exhibiting obscene prints, singing a profane ballad, being an incorrigible rogue, and “trundling a hoop.” LATT described these as laws that “have questionable place in any modern democracy and which have been abolished by our former colonial masters.”
LATT believes that the Constitution, as the supreme law, should not protect legislation that contradicts fundamental rights. “The immunisation of colonial laws and punishments from being declared unconstitutional, more than fifty years after independence, has no place in modern times.” The association called for urgent legislative action to remove the savings law clause and ensure that all laws align with modern human rights standards.
