A new Po­lice Ser­vice Com­mis­sion (PSC) is “good to go” de­spite Op­po­si­tion “ve­to.”

While Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley said yes­ter­day the five peo­ple nom­i­nat­ed to re­con­sti­tute the com­mis­sion are em­i­nent­ly qual­i­fied, Op­po­si­tion leader Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar raised con­cerns about some nom­i­nees, with the Op­po­si­tion vot­ing against all of them.

The dif­fer­ing views on the nom­i­nees came dur­ing yes­ter­day’s Par­lia­ment de­bate on a mo­tion to ap­prove the five mem­bers for the PSC.

But de­spite the Op­po­si­tion’s claims about some nom­i­nees - and their votes against all five - the mo­tion was passed and the new PSC was ap­proved by 21 Gov­ern­ment votes to the Op­po­si­tion’s 19.

Leader of Gov­ern­ment Busi­ness Camille Robin­son-Reg­is is in Scot­land for the Unit­ed Na­tions cli­mate change con­fer­ence, which ends to­mor­row.

The pre­vi­ous com­mis­sion col­lapsed on Sep­tem­ber 25 af­ter com­mis­sion­ers re­signed fol­low­ing a dis­agree­ment with then-chair­man Bliss Seep­er­sad on ad­min­is­tra­tive leave for then-act­ing Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er Gary Grif­fith.

Yes­ter­day, Deputy Speak­er of the House Es­mond Forde pre­sent­ed the no­ti­fi­ca­tions - sent by Pres­i­dent Paula-Mae Weekes - for the new nom­i­nees: re­tired Jus­tice of Ap­peal Ju­dith Jones, fi­nance/man­age­ment ex­pert Max­ine At­tong, so­ci­ol­o­gy ex­pert Ian Kevin Ramd­hanie, fi­nance/man­age­ment con­sul­tant Max­ine King and at­tor­ney Ra­jiv Per­sad.

Row­ley, in pi­lot­ing the mo­tion, said, “They car­ry with them the req­ui­site qual­i­fi­ca­tions and ex­pe­ri­ence and most im­por­tant­ly, that will­ing­ness to pro­vide pub­lic ser­vice to the peo­ple and par­tic­u­lar­ly to the po­lice ser­vice that re­quires it at this time more than ever.

“These five dis­tin­guished cit­i­zens, hav­ing of­fered them­selves to serve on the Po­lice Ser­vice Com­mis­sion, I have every con­fi­dence they will bring the qual­i­ty of their qual­i­fi­ca­tions and ex­pe­ri­ence to bear on any and all is­sues con­cern­ing the Po­lice Ser­vice Com­mis­sion.”

He said he was pleased to say a fin­er crop of qual­i­fied peo­ple could hard­ly have been ad­vanced, “Bring­ing these skills and ex­pe­ri­ence to of­fer in the pub­lic ser­vice at a time when most peo­ple - es­pe­cial­ly peo­ple com­fort­ably placed like these peo­ple are – such peo­ple are re­luc­tant to of­fer them­selves or ac­cept of­fer­ings to po­si­tions of ser­vice in the pub­lic do­main, large­ly be­cause they’re fear­ful or want noth­ing to do with be­ing pil­lo­ried sim­ply be­cause they give pub­lic ser­vice with­in the con­fines of their skills and ex­pe­ri­ence.”

Row­ley said many wouldn’t ac­cept in­vi­ta­tions to pub­lic ser­vice due to the “te­dious arrange­ments” re­quired by the In­tegri­ty Com­mis­sion, “Or that by and large, pub­lic ser­vice is a thank­less job.”

“So I’m grate­ful these five peo­ple have agreed to take the re­spon­si­bil­i­ty for pro­vid­ing T&T, at the Po­lice Ser­vice Com­mis­sion lev­el, with the man­age­ment and skills re­quired to en­sure there’s a func­tion­ing Po­lice Ser­vice Com­mis­sion to do what a Po­lice Ser­vice Com­mis­sion is re­quired to do.’’

Row­ley, de­tail­ing the nom­i­nees’ qual­i­fi­ca­tions, list­ed their back­grounds. He said Jones was em­i­nent­ly qual­i­fied to be­gin what’s re­quired for any PSC, “And we thank for her will­ing­ness to serve.”

He said At­tong’s work ex­pe­ri­ence is quite ex­ten­sive and al­so her pub­lic ser­vice work.

“A per­son from the pri­vate sec­tor who is will­ing to con­tribute some por­tion of her very valu­able time and ex­pe­ri­ence to serve on the PSC - I thank her for her will­ing­ness to serve.”

Row­ley added Ramd­hanie is al­so em­i­nent­ly qual­i­fied in the field of so­ci­ol­o­gy.

“Once again, a cit­i­zen will­ing to serve and on be­half of us in this House - at least those on my side- thank him for his will­ing­ness.”

On King, he said, “We couldn’t ask for a bet­ter per­son.”

Cit­ing Per­sad’s le­gal back­ground and ser­vice in sev­er­al Caribbean is­lands act­ing as a judge, Row­ley said T&T was lucky to get a per­son as well qual­i­fied to even agree to serve on PSC.

Op­po­si­tion con­cerns

In re­sponse, Op­po­si­tion leader Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar raised ques­tions about Ramd­hanie.

She said the Op­po­si­tion had noth­ing against the nom­i­nees who were dis­tin­guished sons and daugh­ters of the soil, but it couldn’t be about qual­i­fi­ca­tion on­ly, since they must be fit for the pur­pose.

She said scruti­ny of nom­i­nees was vi­tal­ly im­por­tant, since the pub­lic must have trust in the PSC’s in­de­pen­dence and ap­pointees must be fierce­ly in­de­pen­dent, free from bias, par­ti­san­ship or po­lit­i­cal sym­pa­thies. Per­sad-Bisses­sar said peo­ple must have trust in a PSC to have con­fi­dence in their de­ter­mi­na­tions and mem­bers couldn’t be seen to be de­pend­ing on rul­ing par­ty, busi­ness stipends or pay­ments.

“A lev­el of trust and con­fi­dence in PSC di­rect­ly cor­re­lates with TTPS, law, or­der and sta­bil­i­ty..this (Par­lia­ment) musn’t be a mere rub­ber stamp for Gov­ern­ment.”

She said the last PSC col­lapsed when “every man­jack” re­signed.

“The cat­a­lyst for this be­gan a year ago when the Prime Min­is­ter wrote the Po­lice Ser­vice Com­mis­sion in­di­cat­ing his dis­plea­sure with (Grif­fith),” she said.

She said the new PSC will have to con­sid­er the last com­mis­sion’s mer­it list for Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice and whether the 188 ap­point­ments which oc­curred since 2009 will be le­gal fol­low­ing the re­cent judge­ment against act­ing ap­point­ments.

Mean­while, out­side the Par­lia­ment, a group staged a Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress “Rev­o­lu­tion” protest, but it was quick­ly was dis­persed by the po­lice.