Mandatory ID proposal under review as Government seeks public input

Gail Alexan­der

Se­nior Po­lit­i­cal Re­porter

“Tell us your views on it.”

That was Home­land Se­cu­ri­ty Min­is­ter Roger Alexan­der’s in­vi­ta­tion to the pub­lic and stake­hold­ers to weigh in on the Gov­ern­ment’s pro­pos­al for all cit­i­zens aged 16 and over to pos­sess a valid form of iden­ti­fi­ca­tion in pub­lic spaces.

“The pro­pos­al is still be­ing ex­am­ined by a Cab­i­net sub-com­mit­tee, but peo­ple need to car­ry their ID for just about every­thing now,” Alexan­der said yes­ter­day.

His com­ments came in re­sponse to ques­tions about the pro­pos­al from Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment deputy leader San­jiv Bood­hu, who re­vealed Gov­ern­ment’s in­ten­tion af­ter leak­ing a Cab­i­net note on the is­sue on­line.

In Ju­ly 2025, Alexan­der an­nounced that the Gov­ern­ment was ex­am­in­ing a pro­pos­al for peo­ple to car­ry iden­ti­fi­ca­tion cards in pub­lic spaces. He said the mea­sure was in­tend­ed to as­sist law en­force­ment in en­forc­ing pro­posed leg­is­la­tion to in­crease the min­i­mum age for al­co­hol con­sump­tion and mar­i­jua­na use from 18 to 21. The Gov­ern­ment had al­so pro­posed in­creas­ing the age for par­tic­i­pa­tion in gam­bling from 18 to 25.

Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar had an­nounced the plans while in Op­po­si­tion and re­it­er­at­ed them af­ter as­sum­ing of­fice in 2025.

In the con­text of the pro­posed bills to in­crease the min­i­mum age for us­ing mar­i­jua­na, con­sum­ing al­co­hol and gam­bling, Alexan­der yes­ter­day said cit­i­zens, as well as po­lice of­fi­cers, had a role to play in en­forc­ing the mea­sures.

He said the time had come for all cit­i­zens to “un­der­stand they have a re­spon­si­bil­i­ty and that in­clud­ed walk­ing in the pub­lic do­main with some form of ID.”

On Tues­day, Bood­hu said the is­sue ap­peared to be ad­vanc­ing. He cit­ed Cab­i­net Minute 810 of April 2, 2026, which in­volved a pro­posed amend­ment to leg­is­la­tion “to re­quire all cit­i­zens 16 years of age and over to pos­sess a valid form of iden­ti­fi­ca­tion in pub­lic spaces.”

Cab­i­net re­ferred the mat­ter to the Fi­nance and Gen­er­al Pur­pos­es sub-com­mit­tee, which meets week­ly.

Bood­hu said: “It would ap­pear from this Cab­i­net Minute that Gov­ern­ment, in its lat­est at­tempt to im­pose op­pres­sive mea­sures up­on the pub­lic, is con­sid­er­ing mak­ing it manda­to­ry for any­one over 16 to car­ry ID when in pub­lic.”

How­ev­er, Alexan­der yes­ter­day said the pro­pos­al was not yet law.

“It’s still be­ing stud­ied by the sub-com­mit­tee. But ask your­self this: If you’re go­ing for a job, seek­ing to con­duct busi­ness or open a bank ac­count, at­tend some schools — or to seek a US visa — you need ID.”

Alexan­der said he knew of a po­lice of­fi­cer who ar­rest­ed a man who known by sev­en dif­fer­ent names, and said iden­ti­fi­ca­tion would have helped es­tab­lish his true iden­ti­ty.

He added: “Hav­ing ID would have helped so many in cas­es over the years of peo­ple ly­ing in hos­pi­tals or oth­er places who may not re­mem­ber their names. In mor­tu­ar­ies, there are bod­ies who aren’t iden­ti­fied. ID al­so helps in courts, where names po­lice have don’t match the per­son be­fore the courts. And how are we to sep­a­rate T&T cit­i­zens from for­eign mi­grants and il­le­gal im­mi­grants? ID.”

He said when the Op­po­si­tion raised con­cerns about such mea­sures, “they could sound like the crim­i­nal el­e­ment.”

How­ev­er, Bood­hu ex­pressed con­cern that a le­gal re­quire­ment to car­ry iden­ti­fi­ca­tion would al­so mean sanc­tions for those who failed to do so.

“You may well be charged with a crim­i­nal of­fence, fined, im­pris­oned or some oth­er way sanc­tioned if, on a Sun­day morn­ing stroll from your home to San­gre Grande Mar­ket, you leave with­out first en­sur­ing you have your ID,” he said.

Bood­hu ques­tioned what would hap­pen to peo­ple who do not dri­ve, have pass­ports or whose iden­ti­fi­ca­tion cards have ex­pired.

“Will you be sanc­tioned for ex­pired ID? This has the po­ten­tial to af­fect all — cit­i­zen and vis­i­tor alike — and is un­prece­dent­ed in a prop­er­ly func­tion­ing de­mo­c­ra­t­ic re­pub­lic,” he said.

Bood­hu said T&T’s cur­rent laws do not re­quire cit­i­zens to own any form of iden­ti­fi­ca­tion.

“There are some coun­tries that re­quire you to own a form of na­tion­al ID. There are very few that re­quire per­sons to car­ry ID in pub­lic,” he said.

Alexan­der, how­ev­er, said dis­cre­tion would be im­por­tant, not­ing a per­son with­out iden­ti­fi­ca­tion could po­ten­tial­ly pro­duce it lat­er at a TTPS sta­tion or po­lice of­fi­cers could use their judge­ment in ap­ply­ing the law.

He said rec­om­men­da­tions on the pro­pos­al could al­so al­low peo­ple to down­load a copy of their pic­ture ID on­to their phones.