Raise marriage age to 18

HWO president Brenda Gopeesingh also noted the organization had not rescinded its position as had been claimed by a temporary Senator during the Senate debate on January 11. “We have not rescinded our position,” Gopeesingh stated and noted that its final statement on the Marriage Acts of Trinidad and Tobago was submitted to the Attorney General’s Office on July 20.

2016 and took the form of a position paper with the heading “Interrogating marriage for 14 year-olds”. “Our position, articulated since 2012 in the resolution coming out of the Marriage Act Public Discussions held by the organisation that year, is that the Marriage Acts should be updated to reflect the age of consent for sexual relations,” the HWO stated, adding a resolution had been presented to the Minister of Legal Affairs in 2013.

with its petition to amend the Marriage Acts. The organization noted that in 2015, the age of consent for sexual relations was changed to 18 years through the Children’s Act which also included a “Romeo clause” and the HWO was compelled to submit a revised resolution to update its position regarding girls between 16 and 18 to be married. This included several factors including: [a] consent from the girl as well as the consent of her parent(s) or guardian (s); [b] that female parents have equal rights of consent; [c] After parties wishing to be married have received pre-marital counselling by qualified professional counsellors. After an application is made to a judge in Chambers or a specially appointed committee by the President of the Republic in order to determine the circumstances of each case; [e] Only after it is determined that the person to whom the 16- 18 year old girl is to be married is not undertaking the marriage for purposes of exploitation and [f] In cases where the person to whom the 16-18 year old girl is to be married is no older than three (3) years her senior at the time of marriage. UNC chairman David Lee yesterday said its two temporary senators.

Dr Waffie Mohammed and Pundit Maharaj, had expressed the views of their respective organizations and not that of the Opposition party. “They weren’t representing the views of the UNC,” Lee said, adding.

“what we wanted to do is.

we felt that when we did our research.

we didn’t feel that there was enough consultation held by the Attorney General prior to laying the Marriage Bill so we decided to give a voice to these organizations that we felt had not been heard and that is why we brought them in as temporary senators.”