The new Squatters Regularisation Bill may result in a “virtual land grab” and sideline the “disadvantaged” people who it is intended to target says Joint Consultative Council for the Construction Industry (JCC) president Afra Raymond. He was speaking yesterday on the Morning Brew television programme on CNC3.
The new Bill, which was passed in Parliament last week Wednesday, changes the date in the old law where people who had illegally occupied state lands up to January 1998 were entitled to be regularised to June 2014. This means that more persons will be regularised and receive certificates of comfort from the State.
Raymond said the bill did not fit in with a proper policy framework. He said the Government’s decision to change the upper limit for those who would have access to the Land for the Landless Programme from $10,000 to $30,000 would sideline the neediest members of society. He asked: “It makes no sense. Now, $30,000 comfortably qualifies someone for a mortgage in excess of $1.6 million, so what are we talking about?
“It is not as it is intended to be. That programme was intended to provide things like squatter regularisation, squatter containment and some affordable service lots for the neediest people in society,” he added. He said extending the upper limit to a household income of $30,000 a month ran the risk of taking the benefits from the needy members of society and giving it to the middle class.
Raymond said, as it stood, the programme was not targetting the landless but was essentially targetting everybody. He said 2009 data from the Central Statistical Office (CSO) gave a national average for household income at $10,000. He said tripling the limit took the programme away from its roots and intentions and away from the people who needed it.
Raymond also spoke about the change in the definition for landless in the law. “When we hear the concept landless, we think about the poorest people in society but Clause 2 of the new law redefines who is a landless person.” The original definition for a landless person, stated in Act 25 of 1998, defined a landless person as someone classified as disadvantaged by the Ministry of Social Development.
The new law defines landless as “a person who has no legal or equitable interest or any other interest or claim to such an interest, in a dwelling house, residential land or agricultural land upon which a dwelling house is permitted to be built.” He said the citizens also had no idea of the numbers involved with the implementation of the bill.
Minister responds
Yesterday, Minister of Land & Marine Resources Jairam Seemungal said Raymond's statements were misleading. "I was disappointed. What he said was very misleading," Seemungal said in a telephone interview. He said Raymond's view that the $30,000 household income limit for the Land for the Landless program me was too high, didn't take into consideration household debts and expenses.
The lower limit for the program me is $8,000. "If two police officers marry, their income will go beyond the $8,000 but if they go to the bank for a loan, you have to remember they have to send their children to school, they have to pay their debts and expenses. "This will result in sometimes three generations paying for a home," Seemungal said.
He said, in addition, many people in the public service were working on contracts and could not obtain loans from financial institutions. He said Raymond missed the point. Regarding the Squatter Regularisation program me, Seemungal said the 60,000 people who would benefit didn't own anything but using little by little they build their homes. He said the certificates of comfort were not just "a piece of paper."
"The certificate of comfort prevents the ejection from land by the state. "You can sleep comfortably knowing the state cannot force you out." He said the certificates of comfort would then progress to a deed or lease.