Juvenile homes are being established. So said Local Government Minister Marlene Coudray during her contribution to yesterday’s Senate debate on a motion to approve the Children’s Authority, Children Community Residences and the Foster Care Regulations. Approval of the regulations are necessary for the full implementation of the package of children protection legislation.
Coudray’s announcement came in the wake of several calls from Opposition and Independent Senators for the police report on the investigation into the death of 14-year-old Brandon Hart-Greaves who had been a resident at the St Michael’s Home for Boys in Diego Martin. Hart-Greaves died in April from head injuries sustained while “play-fighting” with a fellow resident of the home.
Coudray, a former Gender, Youth and Child Development Minister, said both orphaned and young offenders were housed at the home, managed by the Anglican Church. She said Government was moving to have the orphaned separated and the young offenders accommodated at juvenile homes. Independent Senator Helen Drayton said while the Government was investing “so much more in fighting crime and yet it can’t see the hole in the bucket, through which the monies fall.”
She said there was a lack of justice for so many children who had been killed in recent years in T&T and other children who continued to be brutalised and abused. Drayton said such incidents did not begin with the death of Akiel Chambers who was found dead in a pool at the home of Charles and Annelore James in Haleland Park, Maraval, on May 24, 1998. “His death marked a steady decline in the failure to protect children’s lives,” Drayton told legislators.
While admitting the Government was making an effort in the fight against crime, Drayton wanted to know why there was no report on the death of Hart-Greaves. She added: “Was any value placed on the life of that child? “Unless we are serious about stemming the tide of this huge social failure, which is the worst of all our failures, I think the future can only get angrier, more violent and the quality of life will continue to deteriorate.”