AG, UNC clash over Integrity

GOVERNMENT and Opposition clashed yesterday in the Senate over their respective commitment to having Parliament approve declarations of assets forms for the Integrity Commission. The UNC is accusing Government of trying to escape the November 30, 2003 deadline, after which the Commission cannot order Government Ministers and other public officials to declare their assets for 2002.

Public Administration Minister Dr Lenny Saith listed the names of parliamentarians who will comprise the joint select committee (JSC) that will review the forms but Senate Minority Leader Wade Mark removed his name from that list, saying that he would give it “conditionally.” In a news conference immediately following the Senate’s adjournment, Attorney-General Glenda Morean slammed the UNC’s allegations, countering that the Opposition gave their commitment to the JSC but were now reneging on that commitment. “The decision that the forms should be referred to a JSC of Parliament is consistent with a Cabinet decision taken by the UNC administration on June 13, 2001. It should be noted that while taking that decision, the UNC administration also affirmed that this does not in any way stay the implementation of the Integrity in Public Life Act. It is not something that we were now dealing with and something we could change.”

Morean explained that although the JSC officially has to report to Parliament on December 1, that does not mean that the committee has to take that time to report. “The committee can report within a week if it does its work expeditiously. This is all delay. We have a job to do. Let us do the job and get on with it. “What they are accusing us of is the same thing that they are actually doing,” the AG said. Morean added that the UNC still had the option to name Mark or anyone else to sit on the JSC. However her statements were dismissed by the UNC at a news conference minutes later. Mark said it was clear the PNM was abdicating its responsibility towards the Integrity in Public Life Act. “We said on principle we could not support the Speaker’s decision for the JSC,” Mark declared. He said the UNC opposed the JSC because it wanted Parliament to debate the approval of the forms. Mark hinted that had the Government gone this route, it would have received Opposition support.

The UNC chairman said the Opposition would support the JSC if the Committee could submit its report on November 15 instead of December 1. “The PNM is long-winded on words but short on action,” he declared. Mark claimed that while in Opposition, the PNM wanted integrity legislation to be widened and he had information that heads of State companies and statutory authorities had told Prime Minister Patrick Manning they would resign their posts if they had to declare their assets.