For­eign and Cari­com Af­fairs Min­is­ter Sean Sobers is in Wash­ing­ton, DC, for a se­ries of high-lev­el bi­lat­er­al meet­ings with se­nior of­fi­cials of the Unit­ed States gov­ern­ment.

As Trinidad and To­ba­go en­ters what should be its sea­son of re­lief from months of heat and dry weath­er, the coun­try is in­stead con­fronting a trou­bling re­al­i­ty—the rains have of­fi­cial­ly ar­rived, but for many com­mu­ni­ties, the wa­ter still has not.

Op­po­si­tion Leader Pen­ne­lope Beck­les says a de­ci­sion on the fu­ture of Sen­a­tor Janelle John-Bates will be made “soon,” near­ly two weeks af­ter the em­bat­tled sen­a­tor ten­dered her res­ig­na­tion.

Hous­ing Min­is­ter David Lee says the Gov­ern­ment re­mains com­mit­ted to com­ply­ing with pro­cure­ment law, in­sist­ing that no con­tracts linked to the Hous­ing De­vel­op­ment Cor­po­ra­tion (HDC) have been award­ed amid on­go­ing in­ves­ti­ga­tions by the Of­fice of Pro­cure­ment Reg­u­la­tion (OPR).

A for­mer min­is­ter in the Fi­nance Min­istry is warn­ing the Gov­ern­ment against any move to in­tro­duce new tax­es or fines, as un­cer­tain­ty grows over the tim­ing of the mid-year bud­get re­view.

A 74-year-old man from Siparia, who killed his three-year-old son and dis­posed of his body al­most four decades ago, will have to serve over three more years in prison be­fore he can be re­leased.

A man from San Fer­nan­do, whose fam­i­ly has been squat­ting on State land for over 75 years, has scored a le­gal vic­to­ry in his bid to pur­sue a law­suit over dam­age to the prop­er­ty caused by wa­ter from a ma­jor road. 

For­mer head of the In­sti­tute of In­ter­na­tion­al Re­la­tions at the Uni­ver­si­ty of the West In­dies (UWI), Dr An­tho­ny Gon­za­les, says Venezuela’s act­ing Pres­i­dent Del­cy Ro­dríguez should be free to dress as she choos­es, while urg­ing the Gov­ern­ment to “tone down” its crit­i­cism of Cara­cas amid on­go­ing diplo­mat­ic and en­er­gy ne­go­ti­a­tions.

En­er­gy and En­er­gy In­dus­tries Min­is­ter Dr Roodal Mooni­lal has de­fend­ed the Gov­ern­ment’s han­dling of the re­cent off­shore oil spill, stat­ing there is no pol­i­cy re­quir­ing the min­istry to is­sue pub­lic state­ments on mi­nor in­ci­dents.

Ed­u­ca­tion Min­is­ter Dr Michael Dowlath on Tues­day met with the As­so­ci­a­tion of De­nom­i­na­tion­al Boards of Ed­u­ca­tion (ADBE), just days af­ter the as­so­ci­a­tion’s call for talks was high­light­ed in the me­dia.

Trinci­ty Mal­oney MP Camille Robin­son-Reg­is has crit­i­cised the Speak­er of the House, ar­gu­ing that Stand­ing Or­der 28(3) is at risk of be­com­ing an “un­chal­lenge­able shield” for gov­ern­ment se­cre­cy af­ter min­is­ters again re­fused to an­swer ques­tions in Par­lia­ment.

The Ser­vice Sta­tion Own­ers’ As­so­ci­a­tion (ODA) has raised ques­tions about the in­tro­duc­tion of li­dar speed en­force­ment de­vices by the Trinidad and To­ba­go Po­lice Ser­vice (TTPS), say­ing the move comes at a time when ba­sic re­sources re­main lim­it­ed at some po­lice sta­tions such as print­ers, re­ceipt books and oth­er es­sen­tial ad­min­is­tra­tive items.