Senators fear for ‘poor’ teachers

Opposition Senator Cindy Devika Sharma, herself a teacher, said retired teachers currently have a pension fixed at 66 percent of their final salary, and even in this time of rising prices and high inflation, this income would not increase in the coming years. She said many retirees found themselves faced with the added and unexpected extra burden of having to provide for their grandchildren left in their care. Sharma urged that individuals also take responsibility for their pensions in addition to the Government.

Independent Senator Helen Drayton, a former banker, disliked the idea of pensions being indexed to the inflation rate, saying this model was a prescription for a lot of trouble, as has happened elsewhere in the world.

She urged Government to consider a plan for teachers to make individual, voluntary contributions to this State pension plan. “By and large, I do not believe the rank and file of Trinidad and Tobago are in such dire straits that they can’t take responsibility for their financial future,” Drayton said.

Opposition Senator Mohammed Faisal Rahman said the erosion of pensions through inflation was a threat to the “survival opportunities” of retirees. He also said that parallel to the pensions debate, the national patrimony was being spent in non-productive areas, reducing the amount available to the national community.

“We are talking about the sustainability of pension plans, but are not talking about the sustainability of expensive transportation systems,” he warned in an apparent reference to the Government’s proposed Rapid Rail Project.

Local Government Minister Hazel Manning, a former Education Minister, remarked that a MORI poll had shown 71 percent of teachers expressed satisfaction with their job.

Independent Senator Subhas Ramkhelawan urged Government to quicken the pace of its parliamentary legislation, if it truly wanted to make TT an international financial centre.

He said this goal for developing TT would be largely determined by the speed with which financial services laws could be legislated, as he said this country is in competition with other countries with similar ambitions.

“I am tired of dealing with Bills from 2000,” he complained as he urged the Government to set out a clear and coherent parliamentary agenda.

Minister of Education, Esther Le Gendre, in winding up the debate, said the Ministry has a computer information system which can look ahead to see which of the country’s 14,000 teachers are retiring and thereby provide better management than the previous manual method.