CANPTT calls for stronger protections in fireworks bill

The Cit­i­zens Against Noise Pol­lu­tion of Trinidad and To­ba­go (CANPTT) has ac­knowl­edged the progress made with the Fire­works Reg­u­la­tion Bill now be­fore Par­lia­ment but says the leg­is­la­tion re­mains in­com­plete and un­able to pro­tect cit­i­zens in its cur­rent form.

In a state­ment CANPTT not­ed that the Bill marks the first time ex­plo­sive py­rotech­nics are be­ing ad­dressed as an is­sue of pub­lic health and na­tion­al re­spon­si­bil­i­ty. The group recog­nised med­ical pro­fes­sion­als cit­i­zens and or­gan­i­sa­tions that have raised the mat­ter over sev­er­al years. How­ev­er CANPTT said the draft fails to de­fine res­i­den­tial com­mu­ni­ties as pro­tect­ed ar­eas even though most harm oc­curs in homes.

Ac­cord­ing to CANPTT fire­works ex­plode above hous­es and com­mu­ni­ties dis­turb­ing in­fants per­sons with car­diac con­di­tions chil­dren on the neu­ro­di­ver­gent spec­trum and trau­ma sur­vivors. The group ref­er­enced clin­i­cal ob­ser­va­tions link­ing fire­works to in­fant car­diac dis­tress and res­pi­ra­to­ry in­sta­bil­i­ty.

CANPTT said the most se­ri­ous weak­ness of the Bill is the ab­sence of a clear en­force­ment struc­ture. It re­port­ed that cit­i­zens have re­peat­ed­ly said noise con­trol laws are not en­forced and that il­le­gal ex­plo­sive de­vices are sold open­ly.

The or­gan­i­sa­tion re­quest­ed clar­i­ty on which agency will han­dle breach­es how re­ports will be re­ceived the planned re­sponse time the re­sources as­signed the ap­proach to re­peat of­fend­ers whether con­fis­ca­tion and fines will be manda­to­ry and the timetable for a pub­lic ed­u­ca­tion cam­paign.

CANPTT stat­ed that it does not seek a ban on cel­e­bra­tion but wants reg­u­la­tion based on pub­lic health ev­i­dence. It said res­i­den­tial pro­tec­tion en­force­ment sys­tems and penal­ty struc­tures must be strength­ened for the Bill to of­fer re­al pro­tec­tion.