Beckles wants Government to clarify position on body cameras

Op­po­si­tion Leader Pen­ne­lope Beck­les is call­ing on the Gov­ern­ment to clear­ly state its po­si­tion on body-worn cam­eras as Par­lia­ment de­bates leg­is­la­tion that would give po­lice ex­pand­ed search pow­ers dur­ing spe­cial op­er­a­tions.

Con­tribut­ing to de­bate on the Spe­cial Op­er­a­tions Bill, 2026, in the House of Rep­re­sen­ta­tives yes­ter­day, Beck­les said body cam­eras were es­pe­cial­ly im­por­tant giv­en con­cerns about war­rant­less search­es.

Un­der the pro­posed leg­is­la­tion, po­lice of­fi­cers con­duct­ing a spe­cial op­er­a­tion with­in a closed area would be em­pow­ered to search any place or ve­hi­cle with­out a war­rant if they have rea­son­able sus­pi­cion that an of­fence is be­ing com­mit­ted.

Beck­les not­ed that the At­tor­ney Gen­er­al and oth­er Gov­ern­ment mem­bers had high­light­ed safe­guards in the bill, in­clud­ing par­lia­men­tary over­sight and ju­di­cial scruti­ny. How­ev­er, she ques­tioned whether body-worn cam­eras would form part of those pro­tec­tions.

Re­fer­ring to com­ments made by Min­is­ter of Home­land Se­cu­ri­ty Roger Alexan­der on the cur­rent sta­tus of body cam­eras, Beck­les said he had in­di­cat­ed that the Gov­ern­ment would "work with what we have."

She al­so not­ed Alexan­der's ref­er­ence to is­sues in­volv­ing de­fec­tive cam­eras in 2022.

Beck­les ar­gued that the Gov­ern­ment need­ed to be more di­rect about its pol­i­cy on the use of body cam­eras.

"This Gov­ern­ment should make it abun­dant­ly clear to the pub­lic what its pol­i­cy is on body cam­eras. It is ei­ther they agree with it or they do not agree with it," she said.

She al­so urged the Gov­ern­ment to dis­close whether body cam­eras had been or­dered and what the pro­ject­ed cost would be.

"Tell us whether you have or­dered body cam­eras," she said.

Beck­les said the is­sue of body cam­eras had been un­der dis­cus­sion in Trinidad and To­ba­go for many years but had tak­en on greater sig­nif­i­cance amid the coun­try's crime chal­lenges and the en­hanced pow­ers pro­posed un­der the bill.

She added that the pub­lic de­served clar­i­ty on the Gov­ern­ment's po­si­tion, par­tic­u­lar­ly since the leg­is­la­tion is in­tend­ed to re­main in force for two years un­der its sun­set clause.