Kamla rips up Appeals Bill

Siparia MP Kamla Persad-Bissessar tore up a bill on Friday in the House of Representatives to protest its inadequacies, and actually escaped any censure from Speaker of the House Barry Sinanan or members of the Government benches.

The bill falling prey to the former attorney-general was the Summary Courts (Amendment) Act 2003 which will permit convicts’ appeals filed with the prison authorities within seven days, whether or not those appeals reach the Court of Appeal within that statutory time as mandated at present. Persad-Bissessar lamented that 27 convicts had seen their appeals dismissed because under the existing parent Act, the Prison authorities had forwarded their appeals to the court too late."

Also noting that recently six prisoners were freed because they had been imprisoned on consecutive sentences totaling a longer time than the three year limit lawfully allowed, she said: “We will see many, many  more imprisoned.” She warned that these cases could see the State paying exemplary damages for claims for compensation, predicting: “Damages are going to be far more than this $5,000 that you are concerned with for the 27 people.” She urged the Government to rectify this by simply deleting part of the bill.

Noting that one convict had been jailed for seven years longer than allowed by law, she slammed the Government, saying: “You are talking about inefficiency (in the bill). This isn’t ‘inefficiency” but ‘deprivation of liberty’. This is a man’s life, a man who is cut off from his family, placed in a jail because of what you call, the ‘inefficiencies’...”. She slammed Attorney General Glenda Morean’s previous contribution to the bill, saying: “What  nonsense, Mr Speaker, total nonsense. She has a total misunderstanding of what the drafting of a bill is all about.” Persad-Bissessar, a former law teacher then gave Morean, herself a former head of Hugh Wooding Law School, a lesson in legal drafting.

Later Chief Whip Ken Valley interrupted her to question her relevance, arguing: “The second reading of the bill is to discuss the merits of the bill, not for work to be done at committee stage.” Persad-Bissessar hits back: “The substance of this bill is totally flawed, in every respect. It’s not just the drafting. I’m not talking about a comma here and a full-stop there.”  At that Persad-Bissessar tore up the bill, slamming: “There’s no merit to this bill!” She incurred no rebuke from the Chair, who instead actually intervened to protect her from further interruption.