Newsday Editorial
Thursday, November 27 2008
The Tobacco Bill now being debated in Parliament seems to be a case of using a shotgun to kill a mosquito. And, as with a shotgun, there is the danger of injuring innocent bystanders while the mosquito flies free.
To be sure, smoking leads to major health problems for many people. Heart disease, strokes, and cancer are three of the five leading causes of death in Trinidad and Tobago, and all these diseases have been linked to tobacco use. But, at the heart of this issue is the question of rights, including people’s right to harm themselves. A smoker, after all, chooses to smoke. Since people own their bodies (save in slave cultures) it is therefore their right to do as they please with themselves. In respect to tobacco legislation, two main counter-arguments to this position are generally proffered: first, that advertising persuades people to start and continue smoking; and, secondly, that second-hand smoke is as harmful as smoking itself.
Continue reading Smoking gun
So we have come full circle-responding only when the White “massa”, or “missus” in this case, wields the whip. Government has belatedly decided to review its expenditure in light of the global financial and economic crises. The announcement to that effect came immediately after the IMF’s Christina Daseking warned government about its spending spree, saying it must rein in unnecessary expenditure if the country is to weather the global storm.
If the Government is so intent on having citizens use Compressed Natural Gas, Ministers should start by converting their own vehicles to CNG. Speaking in the Senate last Thursday on the issue, Minister in the Finance Ministry Mariano Browne was very gung-ho about all the benefits that would accrue to consumers and the wider society through CNG conversion: fewer emissions, less wear and tear on engines, fewer oil changes, and reduction in engine noise. If this is so, then Mr Browne and his colleagues need to take the lead in installing conversion kits into their new vehicles purchased at low interest rates thanks to their standing as Members of Parliament.
I grew to dislike Budget presentations and the debates that followed them during my five short years as a parliamentarian. For most of that period, the then Prime Minister, Dr Eric Williams, was also Minister of Finance. Like most intellectuals who were also heads of governments in that era, Williams reveled in making lengthy presentations. Having a captive audience comprising 35 MPs, a number of senators and other high-ranking public officials who felt it was their duty to be present for the budget, Williams would drone on and on, sometimes for five, six hours.
It is the height of irony that Government Senator Hazel Manning should be calling for parliamentary privilege to be reviewed. After all, it was her husband, Prime Minister Patrick Manning, who committed a most flagrant abuse of parliamentary privilege last week.