Govt targets single mothers for training

PRIME Minister Patrick Manning announced on Wednesday that Government was embarking on programmes of social intervention to benefit the community and extend the social welfare of the country. He was speaking at the formal opening of Mon Repos Community Centre, Tyler Street, Mon Repos. Manning said women who are single parents and the sole breadwinners of their household will be targetted for specific training to enhance their earning potential. He said implementation of social programmes within communities would “bring about a significant shift” in the pattern of expenditure in the social sector. “There are three major agencies, the Ministry of Community Development and Culture, the Ministry of Social Development and the Office of the Prime Minister’s Social Services Delivery, which are to work as a standing committee in the social sector,” Manning said.

He said single mothers will be trained to produce items for the export market. “These said skills after an appropriate period of time, when they get the hang of how to work them, will lead to them embarking on their own home-grown businesses and earn foreign exchange in the process — making them productive citizens,” the Prime Minister explained. Minister of Community Development and Culture, Joan Yuille-Williams, said Govern-ment was exploring the possibility of using community for retired adolescence partnership programmes. “These services of retired experts will be utilised to provide guidance and teaching to persons of the community with regards to academics, sporting activities and culture,” she said. “In the line of crime prevention within the community, there would be an implementation of a Safety and Enhancement Programme, where officials of the Ministry will be involved in partnership with the Police Service, the Chamber of Commerce and the Trinidad and Tobago Association of Village Council.”